Hedge School: Recent Episodes
Steve Brophy
Breathing alive wisdom through deep inquiry, story, and dialogue. An audio companion to the Hedge School newsletter - https://hedgeschool.substack.com/
hedgeschool.substack.com
Sharing a sneak peak as The Healing Gem of Arcadia makes its way out into the world with a reading of the Foreword & Chapter 1.
Please enjoy Hedge Schoolers!
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
"If I show up and be the best version of myself, the content I've created actually does all the heavy lifting. I've just gotta help people, guide them to have conversations around what they're learning and how that could be implemented in their lives." -Georgia Ellis
Georgia Ellis is a dear friend and confidant. We met in passing days prior to being immersed into a retreat amongst the Redwoods of California in 2019. Her magnitude shines bright, she is a soul set forth to encourage other souls to shine their brightest, not despite the storms, but amidst the storms.
Georgia's capacity shines to captivate and motivate humans to bring forth not only their best selves, but to ignite and awaken those parts of ourselves that lay dormant. It is in this capacity that her orchestrating of combining each subjects unique signature sound lays a harmony to bear. Don't blink, or you'll miss it. Step in time with her, and you'll be it.
Amongst these transcendent qualities, Georgia walks daily with clients and lateral leaders as the Founder of BlueChipMinds.
Georgia believes that as an individual makes personal shifts across body, mind, emotions and spirit organizations also begin to shift, resulting in increased employee engagement, enhanced leadership capabilities, greater output and a winning edge in the market place. She is on a mission to help organizations and individuals thrive and to be an integral part in building a world where more people experience exponential growth through self-mastery.
In this episode we discuss:
-How people can experience exponential growth through self mastery
-How to chip away at our outer crust to reveal our inner gold
-Releasing outdated beliefs
-Noticing the polarities of those who "do the inner work" and those who "are hiding and hoping not to have to change"
-Meeting people where they are
-Leaning in with compassion and curiousity
-Learning how to learn again
-Genuine, generous, curiousity
-Gratitude as an entire somatic/bodily experience
And more!
Resource links to what we discuss are below. Please enjoy this episode Hedge Schoolers!
How to find more of Georgia and BlueChipMinds:
BlueChipsMinds: https://www.bluechipminds.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bluechipminds/
Podcast: https://anchor.fm/lara-foster/episodes/How-to-be-Human-with-Georgia-Ellis-e1oc08g
Resource Links discussed in this episode:
Conversations with God >> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conversations_with_God
The Master Key System - Charles F. Haanel
Metronome video >>
Todd Herman the Alter ego Effect >>
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
This is happening!! This is really happening!! And you Hedge Schoolers are some of the first to know. My debut juvenile fiction novel The Healing Gem of Arcadia will officially be released on October 4th, 2022.
The story is set in the Pacific Northwest of the United States on the Oregon coastline. A place where I grew up with magic, and whimsy and wonder.
Synopsis:
Adam’s dad is sick with a mysterious illness. While Clara’s dad has just up and left her family.
Adam’s Auntie G gives him a treasure map to find a magical healing gem in Arcadia. Clara is approached by Adam and his friends on a full moon, Queen tide summer night to find the gem and save his dad.
The crew is transported through the Arcadia Rock portal to a mysterious land where Auntie G is much younger and shows them how to discover the true power of healing and their own magical powers of intuition.
Will Clara, Adam and their friends reach the gem in time? Join the Arcadian crew as they learn how to fremember together.
Yes. I said, fremember… with an F. As in free-memory. As in future memory. This simple word and term that actually means so much was inspired by my niece Savannah who at three years old used to only say… fremember. “Don’t you fremember?” We started saying it too, and I got curious.. What does fremember mean? How does one fremember?
This story answers those questions.
Huge hat tip goes out of my friend Steve Brophy for writing out the steps of how to publish a book Part 1 & Part 2 and leading the way with his debut Alight in the Lament.
I had so much fun writing this book! I was encouraged by my writing coach Christi Krug to, “write something fun!” back in 2018 when I was amidst the trenches of writing a grief memoir.
The Healing Gem of Arcadia comes from the wonder of growing up in the magical village of Cannon Beach amidst actors, musicians, painters, writers, chefs and artists masquerading as every day people.
American novelistToni Morrison once said:
“If there’s a book you really want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.”
This is that book for me. This is the book that the kid in me needed to read when they were younger to know that everything was going to be ok. This book fills me with so much joy!
I can’t wait to share it with all of you. Thank you to each and every one of you for being along for the ride of this writing and self discovery journey. You truly are the gems in my life.
More to come Hedge Schoolers. Until then. Be well.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
Sharon DeMattia is AN ARTIST and SCIENTIST.
She is a systems thinker, strategic optimist, and creative concepts executive who creates large-scale interactive spaces that explore the interconnected relationships between planet and people.
She's a dragon rider, an invitation to the curious, and a curator of creative genius.
Sharon received her MS from the University of Colorado, Boulder in Kinesiology and Applied Physiology and worked within the Integrative Vascular Biology Lab doing invasive Human subjects research. As her understanding of the integrity of query, methodology, and measurement expanded, so too did her understanding of the fragility and limitations of adhering solely to linear processes and prediction models.
She says, "When we only measure, we tend to miss the meaning; thus causing ecosystems to collapse into themselves from lack of relational cohesion. The art within science is found in the relationships between complex systems and the blurred edges of the spaces between what is purely evidence based."
What is relevant for her right now is how we show up and are accountable to ourselves, others, and the cosmic YES. (excerpted from https://www.themotherexhibit.com/team )
In this episode we discuss:
-Our relationship to the muse
-The language of connection in the soul
-Mother earth and The Mother Exhibit
-We just need to be heard
-Location markers
-Showing up
-The courage to be ourselves
-Becoming the artist and the art simultaneously
-Playing and laughing at yourself in the space between profane and profound
-The balance of structure/space and form/function aka the masculine and the feminine
Two things I learned from this conversation:
How to respect the muse when she shows up! While being consistent and grateful for what she brings!
How to set boundaries for my life and still have compassion for the ways others live their lives outside of those boundaries
So happy to share this with you Hedge Schoolers. <3 Please enjoy the episode!
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
Christi Krug is an author, writing coach and owner of Wildfire Writing. She writes poetry, fantasy, children's novels, literary fiction, memoir, autobiographical fiction, a smattering of horror, inspiration, self-help and you might want to check in with her because next week it could be different.
Christi runs writing retreats in magical places, frequent workshops and teaches at Clark College. Her genuine intrigue for a writers heart and mind is what drew me to her and helped unravel my own writer's prose into published pieces and a forthcoming juvenile fiction fantasy novel.
Christi is every ounce of what she speaks walking the walk, literally everyday on trails, beaches and mountains in the Pacific Northwest and talking the talk with all of her students, counsel and wise friends.
In this episode we discuss:
-Writing principles
-Escaping criticalness
-The Dream Kid & Dr. Codger
-How to move through being outcome oriented
-Allowing your work to begin and end with creative ideas
-Turning creativity and productivity into a game
-STOREY: the artificial things that we build to "try" to get to this place in our lives where we can feel like somebody
-Listening to our bodies, listening to ourselves
-Listening into connecting
-Witness consciousness
The first weekend in December she is holding her next retreat "Write into the Light" at Heceta Head Lighthouse. Please contact either of us for more details.
When asked about inspirational humans,
"Poets… in order to go to a place to hear what wants to be said to me, I need to get quiet, I need to tune into my body, I need to be willing to not just repeat something that I've heard and the way that I heard it," said Christi, adding "As a poet you have to have this pure channel."
Here are some of her favorites:
Paulann Peterson
Naomi Shihab Nye
Anis Mojgani
Kate Gray
Please enjoy the podcast!
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
It’s summer here in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. Iconic jagged edge coastlines, cold aqua blue water, low tides with starfish, barnacles and sea anemones showing face. Fields are hot, cities are still bustling, everyone is looking for a cool place to land.
With days spent touching our toes into the Pacific Ocean I admire the sense of wonder that the magical town of Cannon Beach, OR has woven through me. I hear people say, “This is my happy place.” “I become full of ideas on this coastline.” “This place is enchanting.” And indeed it is.
People passing through for a day, a week, a month or even years. Some never leave. My grandma found this town and its charm in the 70’s reminding her of the villages and cottages that England creates. My mom followed her closely after. And then I arrived. For the most part, none of us have ever left. Allowing our roots to soak deeply into the edges of this place.
More people have arrived and become a part of our family, my uncle, my grandpa, my dad, my stepdad, my little sister, her husband, and my partner Gretchen. Some of these people are still living, some have passed on, but all of us are still loving.
I found myself as a child in this town not really knowing how to define “family”. Was it blood? The people who shared the same bloodline as you? That didn’t make sense because my childhood best friend was adopted and she was loved just as much as I was. Was it having a mom and a dad, and an extended set of grandparents. I had that but parts of my family was estranged. I was lucky enough to have an extremely unusual upbringing.
The question stayed with me. What is family? When I was 12 my mom married my step-dad and I got a new set of grandparents with oodles of uncles, aunties and cousins on the way. Because of this marriage, we were now family. But I didn’t understand. I was technically the “first” grandchild, but in my mind at 12 the doubt shook me into ‘no, not really’. I called my new step-granddad, “Grandpa” for the first time when introducing him to someone I knew in town. His eyes and heart beamed at me. And that sealed the deal. I was now 1000% his.
When my half-sister was born and as she likes to say, “my sister from another mister, but she’s whole in my heart,” I felt the same beaming that my grandpa had exuded years earlier. She was 1000% mine.
Is family ownership? A responsibility or duty to one another? To take care of each other, to show up, to understand and be misunderstood? Is it to have as much fun as possible experiencing this life together? A bit of both?
On Aubrey Marcus recent podcast with Robert Edward Grant, they discuss that anything that doesn’t make sense is a miracle. A perception from the known to the unknown.
I looked over at Gretchen and said, “Well then mom’s new house is a miracle. It’s a miracle house. And Double Creek, that was a miracle too.”
She looked at me and said, “Well then, so are we.”
And in this moment the words pierced into a place in my mind, heart, and soul combined rippling some edge that I didn’t even know was there. My eyes welled with tears and I drew a breath. “That just hits different!” I said still staring into her eyes. And there we sat one miracle looking at another.
My mind let go of trying to make sense of things, to make sense of families, of what’s happening in the world, of what to do next, and we just sat in the presence of one another, each living miracles.
Families are these same kind of miracles.
Families are a willingness to stay together through the dissents, the hard times and the good times. A willingness to communicate what it is that we all need. And then to sit down around the dining room table to eat some good food and play some good board games.
Families are a willingness to be open minded, we welcome new family members in, we love them unless they ask us to do so otherwise, we are there for one another in our greatest moments of need.
I have seen families fall apart, and I have seen estranged brothers and sisters come together for the sole blessing of helping and being present for the passing of one of their siblings. Everything that didn’t matter goes away in these moments. The only thing that is left is love.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
Sitting in darkness,
I feel my heartbeat
drumming life awake
with percussive reverberation
My breath,
the wind of whispers
basks in the haunted eeriness,
knowing we have morning's ear.
Nothing said,
so nothing left to say.
For sudden movements
threaten the crystalline waters
It is here,
I hear,
silence in full majesty.
Nothing said,
nothing left to say.
As the in-between time,
the passing of the guard,
where night meets morn,
where colour hides in shadows
Song is yet to take hold
Nothing said,
nothing left to say.
Hello Hedge School,
The world's scream has gotten the better of me lately. Chatter, distraction, vices, I've used them all to plug my ears. No room for a breath of my own. A second for myself. A silent space to listen with any depth at all.
I'm responsible for the scream volume. Amplified by porous boundaries, I've jumped at all the noises in the night. Reacted to every sound and movement, seemingly frightened by the silence that beckons me.
Constant gorging a space filler.
A run from stillness.
A run from emptiness.
A run from silence.
I'm not afraid of silence. Deep down I yearn for it.
The ego, however, cowers at the sound of silence.
The ego dials up the dopamine volume, yearning for a light in the darkness of solitude.
Constant stimuli, the antidote to boring.
For stillness is boring.
But not as you think. Stillness bores deep into our soul, wading past the shiny labels, worldview narratives and to-do lists to a deeper place. To a place where the words find you. A place where one can hear the language of poetry. The language of place.
"The language of poetry issues from and returns from silence. All words come from silence."
John O'Donohue - Anam Cara
Poetry is the language of the quiet place. The language of a moment. It need not be rhyming words or beautiful phrasing. It is what you hear when you still long enough to let go of all expectations. It might come to you as a lost stare to a beautiful sunrise. A smell with a fond memory. A chuckle at a funny story.
Poetry is beyond words. The memory of silence. And in a human world that is obsessed with always talking, silence is golden.
So protect the quiet space. Let it bore you. Let it bore deep into your soul.
You’ll love what you hear.
Till next time,
Steve
Credits:
Backing track - https://uppbeat.io/track/ben-mcelroy/i-think-it-is
Cover image - Photo by Daniele Levis Pelusi on Unsplash
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
Kelly Potts is a Surf Coach with Maui Surfer Girls and the Founder & President of the All Are We Water Collective. The Collective works in partnership with Tribal and Indigenous communities on the West Coast of the U.S. and in Maui to co-create therapeutic outdoor educational and recreational programs for families.
"Ohana stretches far beyond what we think our normal concepts of family are."
-Kelly Potts
In this episode we discuss:
-Falling in love with volunteering
-Creating nurturing, positive, surf learning environments
-The positive ways surfing can affect people lives
-All Are We Water Collective Summer 2022 offerings
-The importance of being in a community
-Connecting with other humans to engage and build community
-Feeling our most human
-Dancing with life
And more!
Resources:
You can find Kelly Potts on Instagram: www.instagram.com/kellypottssurfer
All Are We Water Collective: www.instagram.com/allarewewatercollective
Maui Surfer Girls: www.instagram.com/mauisurfergirls
Listen to the Podcast on your platform of choice...
Anchor: https://anchor.fm/lara-foster
Apple Podcasts:
Spotify:
And be sure to Like & Subscribe to our YouTube channel!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJuCmYd6q_RFSLbs_pfUwig
HowtobeHuman #HumansBeingHuman #HedgeSchool #Podcast #Interview #HowDoYouHuman #Write #Writing #Communicating #Connecting #SurfCoach #KellyPotts #MauiSurferGirls #AllAreWeWaterCollective #Maui #Hawaii #PacificNorthwest #Surf #Community #Service
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
“Of your silent referee,” I used to sing as a teenager in high school to Sarah McLachlan’s iconic song Angel.
“You’re in the arms of the angel. May you find some comfort here…”
I haven’t thought about that song or those lyrics too much since the 90’s.
Last week I travelled up to George, WA. Yes, clearly the town namesake thought it would be funny to name itself after the United States first president for no other reason than they could.
Anywho, Brandi Carlile was playing at the Gorge Amphitheater a place we hadn’t been since she first headlined the epic venue in 2019. But, not only was Brandi going to be there, this time she was bringing along the absolute legend Sarah McLachlan!
McLachlan is the woman who started, conceived of and made Lilith Fair in 1997. The first festival full of female artists housing greats like Indigo Girls, Sheryl Crow, Tracy Chapman, etc and respectively raised over $10 million for charity.
Every ounce of my teenage heart wanted to go to Lilith Fair. And, every ounce of my closeted heart knew it’d be a bit too obvious to share such a compelling desire. I figured, I could wait just a couple more years ‘til I was out of high school and then I could go do what I really wanted.
In the meantime I listened to Sarah McLachlan on repeat. There’s something about the sensuality of her voice, the way each note starts up high in her seventh chakra then travels it’s way down low into the root chakra winding it’s way all the way back up to the seventh again. Taking you along for the ride with her. Lord knows I wished to create some form of art that could do that too.
Which is exactly what Brandi Carlile dreamed sitting in the audience of Lilith Fair at the Gorge Amphitheater in 1997. And it’s nights like this in 2022 watching the kid who made it from the lawn section seats up to front and center stage and is now headlining the entire show that’ll give one goosebumps! Reminding us all to continue living our truths, keep loving and most of all keep dreaming.
Before the night closed out Sarah McLachlan and Brandi Carlile sang a duet to Angel.
“In the arms of the Angel, fly away from here. From your dark cold hotel room, to the endlessness that you fear. You are pulled from the wreckage of your silent REFEREE….”
Screeeeech record scratch… Wait a second. What. Did. They. Say?
Rev-er-ie !?!? With a v, not an f!?!?
Like reverence? Reverie???
You mean to tell me I’ve been singing that song wrong for nearly twenty five years!?!?
Fu**!!!!
And, then I laughed at myself. Alright. Reverie it is. Who even uses that word anymore? I thought to myself.
Four days later I get an email from Hedge School. It’s titled, “Finding the Reverie in the Mist.” Steve Brophy has penned yet ANOTHER beautiful poem. I stop whatever I am doing when I get the email, I open it up and read.
“To be revered.”
Is that the same word? I have to look it up.
Reverie
rev·er·ie
/ˈrev(ə)rē/
noun
a state of being pleasantly lost in one's thoughts; a daydream.
Reverence/Revered
rev·er·ence
/ˈrev(ə)rəns/
noun
deep respect for someone or something.
The words are not the same, and yet they evoke a similar tone of respecting awe, wonder and being immersed in joy.
Which is exactly the way I feel about friends, people I love, connections, music, inspiration and everything in between. The reverence is palpable.
In Steve’s piece he says, “When we can’t make sense of it all, maybe all we need to do is rejoice in the non-sense of it all.”
I shook my head rejoicing in reverence after reading this. And a winding plug trying to find it’s completion of making sense of these last few years just dropped and let go.
The non-sense brings us closer together. Looking for answers, together. Asking questions of one another and the mist. Unwinding through us solutions to the non-sense in our very own hearts in ways that are surprising and in reverie.
What I really saw, heard and felt when I read Steve’s post was NOT a silent reverie. It was a pounding, beating drum. Moving to a cadence aloud for all to witness and hear. That’s the difference. Angel, by Sarah McLachlan is a beautiful song. But it’s really about a drug addict in a hotel room alone.
Steve illuminated for me what I am happy to remember from time to time. This writing thing isn’t always about who is reading it. These curiosities aren’t always about finding answers. It’s about beating these drums aloud. Sharing these beats together. And letting our lives, our minds and our hearts intertwine to show us the beauty of, as Steve says, “rejoicing in the non-sense.”
Sources:
http://www.cityofgeorge.org/history/history.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilith_Fair
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
Dancing with days
dazed into submission
by the wonder
that peels away when I still myself
In the midst of the mist
lies life
Awash with technicolour frenzy,
brimming with exuberance and endless
layers of detail
There are days
I'm dazed
Catatonic with overwhelm,
usually of my own doing
But in the midst of the mist
I find the daze of days
breathes me alive
If I choose
If I surrender
If I give away
the need to make any sense of it
In the midst of mist
lies every moment
ever lived
Every feeling
ever felt
It is in the midst
that I allow
clarity
to be
misty
To be wonderous
To be revered
Hello Hedge School,
There is great dissonance afoot in our world today. Collective overwhelm for all the senses. Sense itself is non sensical, folding in on itself the closer you look. Flashing across the screens in our hands and in our minds a collective dust storm of another event. Another doing. Another addition to the pile of non-sense.
These are misty times.
Mythic times, where transition is afoot.
We cannot see the next step but know the path lies waiting. Know the clarity will come.
Mythic Origins
Mist is revered in the myths of all cultures. It is a sign that change is coming.
In Irish mythology, mist is magical. Féth fíada or the "mist of the knower" was an invisibility cloak used by the Tuatha Dé Danann, a supernatural race who dwelled in the Otherworld. The mist was used to conceal their appearance from mortal men.
In Norse mythology, mist was a valkyrie. Female servants of Odin who looked for slain warriors on the battlefield or brought messages. They rode on winged horses and their armor would flicker light across the sky creating the Aurora Borealis or Northern Lights.
In Norway, when the mists roll off the mountains, they call it "trolsk." The land is considered enchanted.
There is magic afoot.
Courting the Dissonance
The mist we find ourselves feels thick. Thick enough to strangle our collective breath. Thick enough to compress our chest under the weight of it all. But this dissonance cries out for courtship. Cries out for relationship. We don't need to make sense of it. We just need to revere it.
Revere the fact that non-sense is not defeat but a surrender to the bigger picture. What we select to see paints our worldview. But it is only one worldview. One vantage point. Deep in every moment is a lifetime of moments. A lifetime of selections to paint new worldviews. But instead we lean to the familiar. Lean into old patterns of moving in the world. Moving with the world.
In the mist, reverie is the path forward.
Reverie, from the Old French "reuerye" means "wild conduct, frolic, rejoicing." Rejoicing in the moments that paint us alive gives us hope. Gives us a spring in our step.
When we can't make sense of it all, maybe all we need to do is rejoice in the non-sense of it all. Knowing, as I mentioned in my last post, is a grip of the intellect. Surrender to the greater intelligence that it is all perfect. All non-sensical. And that is just fine. Gripping onto knowing as a lifebuoy is fraught with danger. Reverie is a much more joyful existence.
Rejoice in the next step.
And the next step.
And the next.
Imagine them as your first and last steps.
Oh what joy that would bring!
The mist is magical. There are greater things happening here that we cannot grasp.
Our only task is to court the dissonance. Feel into our senses. Find the reverie as we do.
And trust that the mist lifts.
It always does.
For this too, shall pass.
Till next time,
Steve
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F%C3%A9th_f%C3%ADada
https://mythus.fandom.com/wiki/Valkyrie
https://www.etymonline.com/word/reverie
https://www.traveller.com.au/viking-heritage-norway-myth-mist-and-enchantment-10mp3f
Music - Ofelia's dreamBenjamin Tissot
Image - Photo by Chad Madden on Unsplash
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
I had to laugh at myself today. On a call with a group of folks discussing our current times, lives, and predicaments in the world.
I wasn’t prepared to chat or connect. None of the preferred reading was done on my part. But I showed up anyway. With half a tank.
Sitting amidst a group of deep thinkers, creative innovators and love afficionados I often wonder, “Where’s my place?”
The old words setting me out on another search or journey to find said place, said role, said identity to lash and shout unto the world, “This is me! This is where I am! THIS is what I can do!”
But I stopped myself, laughing today, I didn’t have the energy to push to look to seek anymore. So I listened.
And I shared, exactly what was going on, “Hi ya’ll, I’m not prepared. I didn’t do the reading. I’m at half a tank today. I’m here to listen.”
Something funny happened as I listened. These humans with which I got to interweave from Mexico, Columbia the USA and beyond… I listened deeper.
What is it we are all longing for? To see and be seen? To hear and be heard? To show up and be witnessed? To trust ourselves? Our longings? Our ability and desire to create?
I let it go again and played with the weaving conversations. Here’s what I love about what you just shared… Here’s what it sparked for me… Here’s where I’m curious…
Just relaxing, by default because I’m a little tired, into where the stars might weave themselves. Although I wasn’t really even thinking about that either.
Next up I hear a woman describe her current creative project. I feel inspired and intrigued. I remember this feeling with her before, wanting to know and hear more. But not knowing of a way to reach out to her, I let it go.
And here she was! Telling me about all the things I’d been curious about! And I didn’t do a damn thing to make this moment happen but show up and listen.
I laughed again, at the stars, at my tenacity, at my willingness to just be. For all the times the stars have not aligned, there have been moments I’ve allowed myself to feel defeated. As if alignment is the goal.
Seems to me, the show, the experience, witnessing the web weave itself and coming to a space where we can hear, see, listen, be heard, be seen, and be witnessed is the experience itself. The ongoing dance. The joy of the stars not in alignment and the joy of the dancing stars into alignment again and again. Both and.
It’s funny really, how hard I work myself sometimes. And then when I really let go how that’s when the real “work” begins. And the stars, they’re doing most of it, my real job, or role is just to show up and listen.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
On passing through the womb threshold,
we become anamnesis.
A blank slate to the eye,
tabula rasa to the trained
Written in bones,
an old arrangement.
A place to sit amongst the placed.
Clues sprinkled along the way,
captured by neck hairs
in kairos moments.
In the shadows we cast,
an agitation,
a gnawing if you will,
that there was something you were born to give.
A gift
A song
A weave
A price to pay
But for the life of you
you can't make sense or tail of it
Construct traps lead to empty hands
and bumbling minds.
Concepts, but a shape
you try to fit all of life into
but end up defeated on summits
But the old arrangement can only be heard
in place
in reverie
in fidelity
So sit
humbly
and pray that you will be worn away
to reveal the images written on bones.
Hello Hedge School,
This poem spoke through me a few months back. The words, this seeker's white flag of surrender came as I was overcome with frustration. Frustration is my telltale sign that I am trying to force nature's hand. Desperate moves reeking of impatience and insatiable thirst.
Metaphorically, I feel a mist setting in. Confusion bunkering down for the long hard night.
Interestingly, I find myself in these places when I wade too much into the land of concepts and constructs. A yearning for knowing catches me with overwhelm. Gnowing on the other hand, or direct experience, swaps answer for questions. Swaps fast for slow. Swaps intellect for intelligence.
“When dominated by the human intellect, life is a mere circus, says Sadhguru. But when dominated by the human intelligence, it is nothing less than a dance.”
Sadhguru - Of Mystics and Mistakes
Swapping knowing for gnowing is my first sign the mist is lifting. The first sign my dark night is lifting. Surrendering knowing and trusting starts to tune my ear to all that is around. I fall out of the mind and into the body. Back into participation with all that is unfolding. Back into Gnosis. Gnosis is the Greek word for knowledge. But not knowledge as we know it. It is about "direct knowledge of ultimate truth" gained through experience. Gnowing is my poetic play on words.
A reminder to be in the direct experience surrendering to the experience.
A reminder to merge with the experience.
“The value of knowledge is often higher when it lives in the domain of gnosis. Practice, experience, mastery….these are the keys to gnosis.”
David E. Martin
So in the midst of the mist, I surrender to the experience. Trusting that whatever shows up is perfect and just in time. Being deeply situated, deeply in place, allows me to tune my ears. To notice my place amongst the larger place. To hear my story amongst the larger story.
“This larger story — much deeper than your prosaic personal history — expresses the ultimate meaning of your life, its true significance, in the same way a myth communicates truth or gnosis. To be living that larger story is to be a particular character in a web of relationships and meanings, to have a particular place in the story we call the world. Because it's your larger story, that particular place is your ultimate place.”
Bill Plotkin - Nature and the Human Soul
So to wind out this week, I'll speak to the language I hear when I see my place in the story of the world. I’ll speak in poetry.
The shade a shadow brings
looming as eyes scan skylines
for a sign
Is this the way?
Mimicry absorbs
as you feel into the options
A glance away,
a second guess
fumbled in the darkness
of idolatry.
Searching for a flicker
in the ether,
not knowing the brightest
is built in.
Gasp a breath
of gnosis
and step
shade
to
shine
Till next time,
Steve
Image credit: Photo by Anne Nygård on Unsplash
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
There’s an eerie silence amidst my actions these days. Almost like a winding down. A quiet that I am not so accustomed to. The nervous system that used to clang like bells and whistles feels and sounds more like wind chimes, creeks and streams. As if one of those meditation apps is actually playing inside of me.
Sure, it could be the perfectly curated Instagram only showing me the people, places and subjects that inspire me. Or the “news outlets” that have been turned off in our house for over eight years. It could also be the life transitions. The things, people and projects falling away from my responsibility.
Of course, as we all know, the world is really not that quiet. Cars, people and schedules bustling about. Places to go, people to see, things to DO.
It’s like “Go, Go, Go” has been so tightly wound into our nervous system’s, our collective psyche, that we don’t quite know what to do when the gas pedal and brakes of our lives are no longer needed. I certainly don’t.
I find myself searching… “I could do this”, “I could start that”, “Nothing’s happening, what will I do?”…
Breathing again, I feel the sense in my nervous system, focusing deeper, listening to what really wants to arise, what really wants to be created now.
Nothing comes.
But the tone inside of me is still and soft and sweet. Is this really an opportunity to be?
My mind searches for all the things that “could” happen, all of the things I need to be prepared for, death, famine, wars, environmental changes, health and lifestyle changes…
But none of it is here now. Or is it?
Does our preparation create circumstances within our reality to utilize said readiness? Would I be a fool not to pay any attention to the “things that might happen”?
The misattributed quote from Charles Bukowski comes to mind (you can read more about that here), “Do what you love and let it kill you.”
There are so many angles and interpretations to this quote. First off, “Do what you love” is used in various other quotes from Abraham-Hicks to You Are a BadA** by Jen Sincero.
What does it mean?
To me, it means focus on those things, places and people that which you LOVE.
Taken a step further, what IS love, how does it work, how does love serve you best?
An important note of understanding love, what it is and how it works that only a human with an open heart can fully internally understand. I think it operates different for all of us, with the consideration of how we were raised (and loved), what we were taught about love, and our own individual and unique experiences of love.
So, DO what you love. Do you know what that is? The places, people, motions, experiences and things that light you up the most on the inside? That connect in ways that have you saying, “How did this even happen?” “How did you do that?” “This is amazing” and “I love you”. Love can be celebrated in the peaks and the valleys. On the wedding days, and on death beds. Sometimes grief can teach us how to love even better.
For me, the experience of finding what I loved, started by re-connecting to the child within. Everyone called her LA or Lala (hence we are all living in Lala’s Life Garden now ;) I felt I had somehow lost her along the way of youth, teens and twenties. It doesn’t matter so much how she became lost, but rather how I found her again.
Cultivating play for the sake of her. I brought opportunities into my life to play in ways that I hadn’t for years and years. To play with words. To play with friends. To go run and jump on the beach barefooted without a care in the world. To explore the woods. To learn something new. Through all of these different activities over years and years I started cultivating that spark and connection. I knew when Lala was around. I knew how to encourage her, support her, and show her that I would never leave her side again.
On my most recent podcast How to be Human with Ceylan Kara she talks about an internal sacred marriage. Bringing the masculine and feminine parts of ourselves together, the yin and the yang. Committing to being and working together. I feel as though my experience of getting to know the child within was like retrieving all the feminine parts of myself that I’d abandoned to fit into a very masculine driven Newtonian world.
The wonder of my youth beginning to inspire the wonder in my adulthood. “What would happen if…” angled towards those things that I was genuinely interested and curious about rather than towards apocalyptic dooms day scenarios. As with anything curiosity is a double-edged sword and must be used and aimed wisely.
I find the silence within beating together like a drum. That youthful child and the adult working and dancing in tandem. Showing me a different way to do things. It’s all new. I’m not quite comfortable. Not that that’s the goal. But I sure like to be good at things that I do. More so, I just want to be me. And the kid, that’s the one who helps me remember, who shows me where to look. Who reminds me if I’ve abandoned her again (it’s less and less each day).
I suppose if I could reach into words that might describe the sense I feel now is a notion of unity. The silence, the stillness, the peace. And, I’ve felt it before… I remember this space now. And rather than clinging to what I feel, I am ready to just be here now.
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Hello Hedge School,
Language is a beautiful technology.
A bridge between inner experiences. Words, utterances that vibrate in our ears reach from my world to yours. A meeting place for meaning and collective understanding. Personally, I see the hand selection of words as bouquets of flowers in tribute to the beauty we see in the world.
But words can defeat us.
Can be trapdoors. Shackles that limit the unlimited that flows in abundance from within.
Either way, language is transformative.
A power for good or evil.
I've loved reading and writing for as long as I can remember. Books took me to faraway lands. Paper and pencils brought those lands into the world as a travel destination for others.
Writing was a freedom to dance with language.
I could say that my life changed when I found poetry but that would be a lie. See poetry found me. Sitting on a mountain spot during a vision quest, poetry found me amongst the dirt and stillness. Amongst the fear of darkness and beauty of moments. When I came down from the mountain, words starting singing through me. Whenever I stilled myself, a deluge of words channelled through my fingers. The more I stilled, the clearer the signal.
Poetry became the canvas language danced on.
Since then, I have written hundreds of poems, published a book of poems and have another book on its way. I came out as a poet, claiming the title initially with trepidation. Some friends laughed at the direction change. Others patted me on the back for the courage to sing.
And so I sit in service to language, with poetry as my instrument.
And I look to use those words to stop people in their tracks.
I don't get poetry.
This is a standard line when it comes to poetry. In fact, it's one of the reasons I love poetry so much. Dissonance is woven in, demanding you stop and listen. Poetry is not meant to be trapped.
To be known.
To be gathered for stockpile.
It is meant to stop us in our tracks.
Like a great story, you must find your place in the poem. Let the words wash over you. For one does not read poetry.
One feels poetry.
Heart not mind.
Amongst all the language available, these bouquets have been carefully hand picked to stop you in your tracks.
To wake you from the momentum of lost moments.
The language is not meant to be known. It has been hand selected to be felt deeply. Like birdsong, we must let it have its way with us.
Poetry is trimtab.
Buckminster Fuller is a huge hero of mine. Language was incredibly important to him. And like a true inventor, he contributed words and inventions that changed the world forever. One of those inventions was called a "trimtab."
"A trim tab is a small six-inch wide strip of metal attached by hinges to the trailing edge of a ship's rudder"
The trimtab was developed to help large battleships turn more efficiently. A small strip of metal attached to the edges of the rudder doesn't feel like it should work at helping such a large vessel turn. But this mini rudder generates a low pressure, which helps the larger rudder turn around.
Poetry is trimtab.
Language is the ship.
Poetry applies small pressure. A low pressure pause in your step. As the words enter your psyche, you try to understand them. Sometimes you do. Other times you have no clue. But the words build a low pressure that causes you to change path.
To transition to a new direction.
To a new world
We can get lost in the world of language. Trapped in a world of concepts and typecasting.
Poetry as trimtab, with little pressure applied, helps change our course. It awakens us from sleepwalking by reverence and heart filled listening.
Poetry, from the root world "poiein", which means compose or make, is a composition we sing to the world that through low pressure leads us back to the beauty in the world.
And I'm so grateful it has.
So find your way back to the language of the heart. Let it wash over you. Let it apply the low pressure to enable a course correction to awareness.
You won’t be sorry you did.
Till next week,
Steve
Credits
Music: Unfolding Mirrors by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com
Photo - Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
Hello Hedge School,
My last two posts were a behind the scenes look at the book building process. You can check those out at the links below.
I had hoped the final post in the series would be out much sooner than now. But the Universe had other plans.
You see, it's been a while since writing has been a major priority.
Three weeks of Covid ravaged our household with the worst hit being myself. Vertigo, insomnia, fever, the list goes on. The forced isolation really made me take a look at all the things I do in life. All the balls that I juggle every day. The forced rest meant that many hit the floor and I took this as a time to reassess whether or not I should pick them back up again. I honoured the slowness required.
Along with Covid, we held space for death. Death has been a constant companion at the family table as we navigated the battle my wife's mother faced with the incessant nature of Cancer. For the past six months, we have seen the end on the horizon. Felt the thin veil.
Sadly, her battle ended on April 5. Her last breath taken with my wife holding her hand.
As you can imagine, it resurfaced old wounds. Familiar but different. I never got the time to say the unsaid things to my brother. His was a sudden departure. An eruption. Margaret, a beautiful human being who lived to be in service to others and to squeeze the most out of life, chose to walk towards the sunset her way. It was a masterclass in dignity. A true blessing to witness.
Conversations with my kids, my wife, have all revolved around what happens when someone we love and hold dear is "gone." That inquiry is still having its way with me so I’ll surface it once I have more clarity.
Amongst all of this, the first copy of my book landed on my doorstop. My tribute to lament, a weave of roses and thorns, showed up as a light amidst the darkness.
A sixteen year journey to the summit now in my hands.
The book arrival was a very average moment. There was no grand affair. It just showed up. For so long, it had been a horizon that I moved towards and ran from. I had built up the moment to be so much more and it was just average. Not a downplay of the moment, just a recognition of the deliciousness of an average moment.
Significant insignificance.
I didn't need to write the book but I did. I chose to unveil the inner workings of my own journey with grief. It also didn't matter if I didn't write the book. Life went on as it does. It was liberating to feel that it doesn't matter and because it doesn't matter, it's all the more reason to do so.
I was also kicking myself for waiting so long. In my head, I had made that summit insurmountable.
But it wasn't that at all.
I instantly starting turning my attention to my next book. Why? Death spurred me on. I love writing. Crafting story and language breathes me alive and so I choose to spend my time hand selecting words and singing songs that reverberate in my heart. And I feel called to help others do the same.
For budding and established writers, I will be launching a community really soon. It will be a space to share your expression, have others listen and feedback resonance and an opportunity to put in the support structures needed to bring your writing to the world. I’ll share more once the offer is live.
For those interested in purchasing Alight in the Lament, you can do so via the link below.
As for the third post in my series about the book writing process, I’ll bring that to light next week.
Till next time,
Steve
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
“Oh no… I did it again,” I said shaking my head hearing Britney Spears sing me the chorus of ‘Oops I did it again...’ while talking to Steve Brophy on the most recent episode of the How to be Human Podcast. “I talked about the sh*t A – Gain.” He laughed, having just read my recent post ‘Processing Our Grief’ for Hedge School.
Grief is not a stranger to either of us. In fact, many folx that I have come across in my life who are burning with a passion, who are alight and alive in the world have also traversed shame, trauma and/or grief in some form.
So why does it keep coming up?
To me, it’s a part of life that we can’t escape and I’d just rather face it (most of the time), than pretend like it’s not there. But WHY do we really talk about it? Ahhh… there she is, the gem underneath, the light in the lament, joy.
From the Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
joy
noun
\ ˈjȯi \
Definition of joy
(Entry 1 of 2)
1a: the emotion evoked by well-being, success, or good fortune or by the prospect of possessing what one desires : DELIGHT
1b: the expression or exhibition of such emotion : GAIETY
2: a state of happiness or felicity : BLISS
3: a source or cause of delight
joy
verb
joyed; joying; joys
Definition of joy (Entry 2 of 2)
intransitive verb
: to experience great pleasure or delight : REJOICE
transitive verb
1archaic : GLADDEN
2archaic : ENJOY
I learned about joy as a kid in church. We sang beautiful songs about joy especially at Christmas time. “Joy to the worlldddd…” But I never thought about what it meant.
Then as a teenager, I met a human named Joy. She was the COOLEST human I’d ever met in my life. She was beautiful, she was fun, she was hilarious and she had swag! She was the kind of person other people just wanted to be around. She was lit! With joy and her name was Joy!
Any time I was close to Joy I felt joyful. She gave me hope for a life and a future that matched my soul. And, while I was close, the joy was not mine, it was hers.
I’ve been searching for this kind of joy. A joy all of my own. Not in the selfish sense as if I need to keep it for myself, but in the sense of being able to internally produce this joy continually no matter what is occurring outside of me.
We could take a deep dive into the neurophysiology, how your brain and body patterns and recognizes joy, but there’s tons of other writers and podcasts for that. What I’d like to do is paint a picture of discovering, flourishing in and expanding our own grounded and centered joy.
How do we do that?
One of the ways is, we flip the script. We stop working so hard and we find ways to play. We remember ourselves as kids, those moments of pure fleeting aliveness and we re-engage this space again and again. Do you remember what you loved as a kid?
We bring our friends with us. We play together. We help them remember and they help us to embody what we remember even more.
We learn the fleeting instances of illusions of joy. For me, a few vices come to mind. I used to love beer. I used to think it brought me joy, well really the only joy I was able to feel in the early 2000’s. But it wreaked havoc on my body, my mind, my emotions and more importantly my relationships. Beer for me is not real joy.
These days the joy I sense can be found in moments of connection and inspiration. I see two people I introduced together, co-creating or healing something, I feel joy. It’s quiet, and subdued, and flooding internally, but it’s there, it’s joy and I celebrate it.
I solve a really hard coding problem to get some project to the next step. You better believe I stand up, put my arms in the air and hold the celebration for at least 20 seconds so my body can soak up the feeling and remember it.
I create a space, a table or home or project all of my own and I invite loved ones to connect, to engage, to enjoy, to feel the space together… to Fremember. And that’s the kind of joy that just keeps reverberating out.
Am I master of joy? Not quite yet. I am a student on the path of joy. And I see no reason why you can’t be too.
*For all those wondering “Fremember” is a term my niece and nephew created. We’ll be diving into Fremembering and joy over the next several months together. Stay tuned.
Be well Hedge Schoolers.
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hedgeschool.substack.com
It would only be fitting that our dear Steve Brophy is officially the 7th episode of the new How to be Human Podcast. And, as I learned last month just weeks before chatting with Steve, we both were born on March 7th as well. Such a treat to celebrate our birthdays in tandem, through the curiosities of Hedge School, blossoming into what you're seeing now.
Steve is the creator of Hedge School a newsletter dedicated to reimagining learnedness. Hedge School is the original publication home of the How to be Human Series.
A self termed listener and re-story-er, Steve shares his delectable insights with all those tuning in for the treats glimmering from his soul. He has an uncanny way of delivering the definition of words you've never heard before and using them in ways you may not have imagined. And Steve is tenderly as David White says, "Writing the one line in the book of the world that only (he) can write."
Steve also just released his first book Alight in the Lament which features the telling of his own process of grief interwoven with beautiful poetry. He says, "It is about finding through grief hope and light and a way forward through the darkness."
In this episode we explore:
-Signature Sounds
-The reciprocity of writer/reader, speaker/listener
-The evolution of curiosity
-Alight in the Lament
-Speaking alive stories
-Being a member of the sh*t club
-Poetry as a collective language experience
-Finding our voice
-Humans weaving on the sentient level
-Perturbation
-You at your original source and finding our way back to that
-Honoring the source material
-Allowing ourselves to be swallowed by big nature
-Creating conditions for engagement (aka boundaries)
And more!
HowToBeHuman #HumansBeingHuman
Please view the interviews from the How to be Human Series at YouTube and Listen to the Podcast here.
Subscribe at hedgeschool.substack.com
Calling all empaths, intuitives, vibration and energy sensers! Have you awakened your gift of deep and wide sensing? Have you learned how to become empowered through what you notice, sense, see, intuit and feel? Tune in as we hear how previous empath in denial Josie Coleman came to light with her own gifts and is utilizing them to serve the world now.
How to be Human - Episode 6 with Josie Coleman
In this episode we cover:
Intuition Ethics
"Out of control healers"
Spiritual arcs
Spiritual beings experiencing a human existence
How the "programming" in our minds affects the way we think about things
Deconstructing the way we think, to put our attention towards what we really want
Reckoning as recognizing
How to really listen to another human
Pulling energy back and utilizing a Golden Sun
Lifelong learning
Co-creating with others
Resources:
Josie Coleman: https://www.josiecoleman.com/
Lotus Lantern: https://lotuslantern.org/
Intuition Classes: https://liliana.mykajabi.com/store
Subscribe at hedgeschool.substack.com
Hello Hedge School
Welcome to part two of my self publishing journey. Part one is the hard part. Climbing that mountain requires consistency and plenty of will. Part two, although easier, was completely uncharted territory for me. Writing and editing writing is familiar. Understanding the process required to take that edited piece and bring it to the world was challenging. Hopefully this helps provide a little light for you on your own journey. I will share with full transparency the whole process. It is not the only way to get a book into the world, it is just the path I walked this time. Be sure to check out Part 1 to help set the scene.
Set up
To begin, every book needs an IBSN. IBSN is an abbreviation for International Book Standard Number. This is your book's unique identifier. It contains all the essential information about your book and increases the likelihood that it will be found and purchased. This is essential if you have dreams about your book being in a bookstore or library some day.
In Australia, Thorpe-Bowker is the place to purchase. Internationally, Bowker is the place to go. A one-off set up fee of $55AUD is required to set you up. After that, you can purchase IBSNs individually or in bulk. Individually they are extortionate, coming in at $44AUD for one. Luckily, the bulk order of ten is much more budget friendly, coming in at $88AUD for ten.
As well as your IBSN, you will want to purchase a barcode with your IBSN embedded. This is really only needed if you wish to be in physical bookstores. It allows your book to be easily scanned for purchasing. Individual barcodes are $45AUD or cheaper if you purchase six or more.
Book builders
I wrote the bulk of my book in Roam and then moved to Google docs for the editing process and final draft. How the book looked in a word processor was completely different to how it ended up looking. To help with this, there are two great book builders that allow you to format your book the way you want and have it perfect for printing or eBook status.
If you wish to only publish an eBook, Reedsy's book builder is your best bet (Draft2Digital is another option). You can upload a document and format in this builder for free. This book builder is the better builder in my opinion but I chose another because it solved more problems for me.
After some great conversations with good friend Michael Lauria, I chose IngramSpark as my book builder of choice. IngramSpark's global distribution and Print on Demand features were the key sellers for me. In the world of self publishing, IngramSpark and Kindle Direct Publishing are the two key players. Personally, the Amazon ecosystem didn't set well with me. They took a larger cut. There was a lot of proprietary stuff that I didn't jell with, aka your book lives really only in the Amazon ecosystem. The main point though was their impact on local indie bookstores. No one can compete on price and I, for one, love a local bookstore.
With IngramSpark, my book will be available on Amazon but I have a network of local indie bookstores I can sell my book too also. Print on Demand was also a great feature. With IngramSpark, when my book is purchased, the printing is done at the closest local IngramSpark printing service. With global printing locales, this means that book is cheaper for readers to purchase, but more importantly, it means that the carbon footprint of the book is reduced as I don't need to send copies all over the world from Australia.
IngramSpark's book builder took a little while to get used to but it is really powerful and I am really stoked with how my book turned out.
Book set up
To set your book up on IngramSpark, you need to decide which option suits. $49AUD will get you either a print only version or you can choose the eBook/Print option for the same price. Be mindful, each book format requires its own separate IBSN. I chose the eBook/Print option and allocated two IBSNs from the ten I purchased. You pay the cost at the end of process, aka when your book is ready to meet the world.
Book information
IngramSpark have a lot of great free resources to help you along the way but for a physical book, my best advice is to select books you already own and use them as a guide. My dear friend Leslie Lau gifted me the idea to have my book the same size as Wendell Berry's "The Peace of the Wild Things." I love that book and how it felt to hold. To get the exact dimensions (Trim Size), I looked the book up on Amazon and scrolled down for the dimensions. This will give you the exact details you need to set up your book.
You then need to make some choices.
Book type - Paperback, Hard cover, or Dust Jacket (with Digital Cloth Cover)
Select Black & White or Colour interior
Paper Type - 50lb White, 50lb Creme or 70lb White
Cover finish - Matte or Gloss
Page count and spine width are automatically calculated for you when you add your content to the book builder.
Once this content has been selected, you have set up your Book Info.
Interior Formatting
The next stage is adding your content. There is an easy upload feature which will automatically upload all of your content or you can simply copy and paste into the builder.
You will need to choose a layout. There are a few to choose from and all have great previews to show you what your book could look like. Once you have content in place, there is also a preview button which shows you what your book would look like in that format. Seeing this is really inspiring and great motivation to keep on going.
The book builder is easy to set up and use. There are a range of types available for each section (Chapter, Notes, Part, References, etc...) which will format your book just how you want. Any changes to the text editor require the preview to be updated but it isn't too much of a hassle. Make sure you save your work as you go
This process is where you will spend the bulk of your time. I constantly reread my book to look for errors or adjustments that may have been missed in the editing process. Line breaks, readability, and spacing were key for me. I wanted to allow my words room to breathe. In the end, extra pages were added as I did this. In the end, my book was 84 pages long. Not a tome but just perfect for alight in the lament.
Cover design
The last phase is Cover design. This is so crucial. I started an image collection of book covers that I liked or felt would work for “alight in the lament”. There are many great book cover designers out there. IngramSpark offer this as a service as well. I chose to do my own. Budget was a factor here. My cover design was done in Canva and finished in Photoshop.
If you choose images, please make sure that you have permission to use in a print medium. Unsplash and Pexels are great places to start to find images to use. You can upload your image and build the book cover in IngramSpark but I found the fonts limited. Instead, I found a free font I liked (one with publishing rights) and built my book cover outside of IngramSpark. My wife is a designer so I used her creative genius to guide me. High resolution images are key here. Prints need high resolution (300dpi is optimal) but the limiting factor with IngramSpark was the upload feature had a size limit and high resolution files are large in size. I created a template in Photoshop and adjusted the resolution to reduce the file size. It took a considerable amount of time but in the end, I was really happy with the results.
Another feature of your book cover is the blurb. As I did with my writing, I vomited up a draft and lent on the editing skills of my Signature Sound compadres, Leslie and Benny Wallington. Great editors are key to any book. I am forever grateful for the blurb. It is better than anything I could have done on my own.
Finally, the book needs your author bio. I suck at bios but I'm proud of this one. I just let it flow and I'm stoked that with the end result.
Book approval
Once you have read and reread your book a multitude of times, you can choose to have your book approved. This provides you with a proof to check over. I found a few things I wanted to tweak here so I adjusted the content in the builder and selected Approve again.
With the final page numbers ready, you can see how much it will cost to print one copy. I have attached the latest version of the pricing to give you a sense of how much it costs to print one copy.
Title information
With your book now ready to meet the world, you need to start working through the final stages. This includes selecting the price. IngramSpark step you through this whole process. The part that I stumbled on was related to global distribution. Typically, for a book retailer to pick up your book, you need to specify the price discount that they would get your book at. 55% of the total price is the usual amount. This allows retailers to add their markup. As you adjust your price, IngramSpark let you know how much you would make per book. The book for me was never about this but it is important information to know. It is one of the tradeoffs for a global distribution network. Everyone gets their slice of the pie. Other decisions you will need to make are related to returns. You have three choices here - No, Return to you, Return and destroy. No is easy to understand. This will impact your ability to be picked up by a retailer. Book retailers need the ability to return stock that did not sell. They will not pick it up if there is not that option. Return to you feels like a good move but the cost of the return is on you. This may add up over time. Return and destroy is exactly that. The book is returned to the IngramSpark local publishing site and destroyed.
Personally, I chose not to offer book returns. I'm not seeking to have my books in stores across the world. This story requires a yarn and I would like to warmly introduce it.
Once you move through the guided process for Title Set up, you are ready to hit approve. You will get sent a final proof to tick off on. Once again, read this carefully. I noticed an error that I missed and so I went through the whole process again. There is no cost for this.
To get your book into the IngramSpark supply chain, you approve the final step. There are a few options here but they are pretty self explanatory.
For next time, I'll step through the process of where to sell and how that looks. I'm currently in that land fumbling my way around. This blog post is also another good resource to help you on your journey. If you are keen to bring to light your words, please hit respond.
Till next time,
Steve
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One of my first jobs out of college was becoming a sports journalist and photographer for a local newspaper. My editor and I reworked the entire sports section making it its own landing page in the paper. I wrote most of the stories published to this section and took all of the photos. It was a rewarding job in many ways.
During this time, personally, I was also struggling deeply. All of my compounded emotions from childhood and teens that I didn’t know how to process began stacking up on my body in the form of pounds. I’d been a star athlete in my high school years and now after college I was twice the size of myself.
One way I was able to metaphorically play with the puns of my own life and circumstances was by writing an editorial. I aptly called it ‘On the Sidelines’. In my mind this stood for two things. I was literally standing on the sidelines of every soccer, volleyball, football, cross country, basketball, wrestling, swimming, softball and baseball game in the area. And the second, I honestly felt like I was standing on the sidelines of my very own life.
After many changes, and years of determination and discipline I’ve been fortunate to also write, ‘From on the Sidelines to in the Game’, since that time as so much has shifted in my life since those years (there are stories upon stories for another day). Reminding me that I eventually did take that step into the arena.
Funnily enough, my editor from those days, reached out to me just last week! She needed help with a project and I was glad to respond to her in kind. But this simple gesture reminded me of my life in those days and despite the struggle, I instantly became grateful. Her note was like a sweeping gesture of gratitude moving through me. I remembered what we created together, I remembered how proud I felt standing side by side with her and showing our creation to the world, and most of all, I remembered how much she believed in me and fought for my ideas to come to fruition. Rebecca Herren, if you’re reading this, Thank you!
Which leads us here, this week, almost 20 years later… to Standing in the Opening. Obviously, I’m still writing Op Ed’s about my own life and experience. There is a sense of service in the words I write. I write for you and me, and all those that these words will someday reach and impact. I write, because sometimes our journeys can be lonely. As another mentor of mine posted this last week, “No one told me how lonely healing could be.”
True. Story.
When I was in an especially dark and chaotic time about ten years ago, compounded by grief and spiritual crisis, there was one thing I wanted. I wanted to hear other people’s experience. I didn’t want them to tell me what to do. I wanted to hear what their moments were like during each breath and step of their dark and light days. There were a few books that came to light during these times, one of which was, Apprenticed to Spirit: The Education of a Soul by David Spangler.
“Where two or more are gathered in the name of that which loves, that which is compassionate, that which liberates, there blessing is also.” ― David Spangler, Blessing
In the book, Spangler details how we can “lead lives of greater blessing and to be of service for the world as a whole.” All the topics, basic surface layer conversations never get to. And while I was reading alone in my very own living room it was like I could feel the presence of every person who had ever read, or ever will read that book, all in a group reading at the same time with me. The sense was, I am not alone. Even though I was, in my living room, and yet I wasn’t in my heart and soul.
This. Is. Why. I. Write.
We, are not alone. We can tune into these senses and feelings of togetherness, connectedness during times of struggle and beyond. Our capacity to honestly know this part of ourselves is one of our greatest gifts as humans. I could go on and on, yet there’s so much I don’t know.
We’ll leave it there.
The Opening. Have you ever completed a certain phase of your life? Perhaps high school, home, college, a relationship, a job, a destiny?
And where do you go next? What are the parameters for that next step? Is it to flee and survive a situation? Is it to lean towards that which lights you up? Is it to pause and listen?
Our treatment of the Opening is a clear indication of our treatment of Creativity herself.
Honestly, none of these words seem to be working right now. How can I talk about the Opening when Russia is invading Ukraine? Anything that I go through, in my privileged life, seems miniscule compared to the openings that are being created by humans having to leave their homes, their families, their towns, ALL that they have known…
The spiral of injustice continues.
And this is a story that has drowned me many times before, left me sitting on the sidelines of my very own life. The question needs to become, how can we hold what is happening in the greater world while holding what is happening in our very own lives?
It’s a dual position stance. One doesn’t take precedence over the other. They are intertwined. And so I must, I must honestly look at the Opening here at home, with the people that surround me, in my very own heart.
Standing. In. The. Opening. Together.
All of me wants to have a “next” sitting readily available in my hands. The next venture, the next passion, the next project, the next destiny, the next great solution…
And while nothing is here, yet, all of me also knows I am perfectly calm, safe, and centered right where I am. I am listening alert and aware. Moving with Full Body Yes’. My compass has been restored and it is fully in tact!
My heart’s desire is to do that which I am most called to do, being of service through my experiences, perspectives, thoughts, feelings and senses in alignment with the Best Possible Outcome for ALL involved, including myself.
Another part of me is afraid. Afraid, if I wait, by being patient, listening, observing, then responding to what life presents that I’ll only be pulled towards someone else’s desire or destiny being a conduit for their manifestations of creation.
Friends, comrades and guides ask, “Is it true?”
And actually, it’s not! For the change is in me. I know what I want now. And even if I don’t know what that looks like, I can sense the essence of it. Those full body yes’ really do add up!
Standing in the Opening seems to be more about Presence than anything. And maybe there isn’t an action step other than to fully be, fully breathe, fully sense in this moment… and when an opportunity arises to step forward when it’s a FULL BODY YES the step takes itself.
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Hello Hedge School,
The past few weeks have been entirely focused on bringing my book "alight to the lament" to daylight. I chose to self publish so I could be in charge of the whole process. The book was too personal for any other option. The freedom that self publishing brings is matched by the information overwhelm of what to do next. There are so many moving parts to getting a book out into the world. I had delusions of having the book out earlier but each step has taken longer than anticipated. Wary of rushing the final stages, I've learned to temper my expectations and thoroughly embrace each step of the process. To honour that process and to provide you with a little light on your own self publishing endeavour, I'm going to outline my journey over the last few years. I'll unfurl this process over a few posts so that I can go into depth without walloping you with information overwhelm.
“alight in the lament” will be available for purchase in the next few weeks.
Sitting in the chair
Writing brings me great joy. And frustration. Words flow. And don't. But a book doesn't get written without a dedication to discipline and a love for words dancing across the page. Daily writing has driven this for me. Every little bit counts. For this book, I have written numerous versions. Many shitty words have led to volumes that will never see the light of day. But necessary for the gold to show up.
Quantity counts here.
Writing every day, no matter how small, leads to a large amount of writing. It leads to a flow, which can lead to a deluge.
Sitting in the chair every day is paramount.
So is enjoying the process.
Collation and curation
Collating the words into a program like Roam Research, OneNote or Notion, help provide inspiration for the next day's writing. Like Hemingway, I leave sentences unfinished as a jumpstart for the slow day's of writing. Being organised as a writer helps you notice the patterns, see the growth amongst your writing and collect all inspiration. Roam Research, plus a good old notebook, are my writing partners of choice. For much of my writing, I have followed Seth Godin's advice, and shipped my shitty drafts. Hedge School has been a place to put versions of my book into the world so I can receive resonant feedback. Posting to a weekly/fortnightly schedule has also provided the necessary constraint to drive performance. Recording the Hedge School posts has been brilliant for fluidity and proof reading. Animating the words with voice really helps.
Once I have the bulk, I move it to Google Docs ready for the next stage.
Editing
Writing can be a lonely endeavour. The process of writing itself is soul searching. So too is pressing publish and hearing crickets.
All writers need readers.
Feedback completes the feedforward loop. Provides the compost for nourishing writing improvement. Once I had my first shitty draft ready, I reached out to two dear friends of mine, Leslie Lau and Benny Wallington, to help with editing. This experience changed everything for me. Les and Benny took turns editing the manuscript, leaving comments, suggestions, questions and edits in the document. I was really nervous about this process because of the importance of this book. Over a number of weeks, I had calls with Benny and Les to learn about their resonance experience while reading. I adjusted the prose and they read again. Both are talented writers and editors and I surrendered to their guidance. It was truly an experience of being held. Both tended with care and precision, helping to tighten up the piece. A great editor helps tremendously. I returned the favour to each of them as I read their own works and held space.
Spend as long on this process as you did writing the book, you will be glad you did!
This experience catalysed an idea that Les and I had for a community we called Signature Sound. Editors can edit words or they can listen with a depth that helps the true essence of the work be born. The Zoom calls allowed for this level of intimacy. The editing process was an alchemical process and I am forever better as a writer for the experience.
Les, Benny and I are now taking six people through that same experience. "alight in the lament" will be the second Signature Sound publication. Benny's book "Get Connected", written with his partner Jacqui, is the first. You can check that out at www.getbook.info
More to come on Signature Sound in future editions.
Once my manuscript was about 90% there, I began the process of book creation. I'll leave that to next week so I can provide real depth. Getting to the point of manuscript takes dedication and a willingness to move through some pretty hectic seasons.
Most people want to write a book.
Most people don't.
The goal of Signature Sound and "alight in the lament" is to help those who dream one day of holding their own original work in their hands achieve that. If this sounds like you, drop a comment below. People will spurt some b**t about there being enough books in the world.
But the world does not have yours.
Till next week,
Steve
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What a treat Hedge Schoolers! This week on the How to be Human series we’ve got our special guest Jaleel Mackey.
Jaleel is co-founder (with Tom Williamson) of Breath Rise + Thrive which started in 2020. "The message kind of came to me, I know breathwork, I know meditation, I know what it means to navigate times of uncertainty… I know what it means to try to fix my life, repair the brokenness. And try to come out on the other side with a little bit more clarity and purpose and a sense of who I am. And so I said, you know what, I'm best suited in the streets, in the trenches. So I quit my job at Google, started BRT, to teach people breathwork, meditation and other types of peak performance tools for them to navigate times of uncertainty. Which it felt like the world really needed at that time." -Jaleel Mackey
In this episode we cover:
Setting intentional time to be emotional
How to put yourself back together
Emotional dexterity as a practice
How to express anger productively
Using the breath to remember our humanness
Naming emotions in conversation
Creating opportunities for connection and dialogue
Detaching from outcomes
Authenticity & Vulnerability
You can find Jaleel on Instagram here and LinkedIn here.
Breathe, Rise + Thrive here.
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Hello Hedge School,
What do you sound like when you finally speak?
These words open a poem that was written through me. Titled, Signature Sound, the poem is a journey of remembrance. A journey back to the sound that speaks through you when you are most alive. A sound most of us have forgotten.
Lost under layers of conditioning. Muffled under other people's expectations, our own distinct voice is stifled. Mimicry. Fitting in. Fear. The sound we share when we speak often feels foreign. Like someone else is speaking. Someone else's voice escapes through your lips.
But we do get glimpses of our own natural magic. Our own Signature Sound. Our own sign of nature sound. Moments where we disappear into moments, becoming a channel for spirit, allow that sound to be set free. And that music is enlivening.
For it is our true voice.
Listening is how we find our way back to that true voice.
Rediscovering your Signature Sound is the art of growing our ears back.
Deep listening
There is much to learn from the oldest continuing culture on Earth, the First Nations people of Australia. Custodians of the land I'm blessed to call home for thousands of years, Indigenous Australians are masters of deep listening. The Aboriginal peoples of the Daly River region in the Northern Territory of Australia call this "dadirri."
“Dadirri recognises the deep spring that is inside us. We call on it and it calls to us. This is the gift that Australia is thirsting for. It is something like what you call contemplation.”Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr - 2021 Senior Australian of the Year
This beautiful video gives you a glimpse of the deep spring inside.
Deep listening is a key component of all Indigenous Australian cultures. The core characteristics of Deep Listening are:
Respect underpins our relationships with each other and with the land;
Time is invested in relationships and the building of trust;
Our understanding of ways of knowing is broadened and deepened;
Creativity is embedded into the way we learn; and
A quality of care infuses our relationships and our work with each other.
Source: LivingCircle21
Deep listening is the deepening of relationship. With the land. With the sentient beings that co-inhabit the space. With yourself. It is through being still in place that we rediscover who we are and learn new ways of knowing. Learn new ways of coexisting. Personally, I find that such stillness fills me with words only poetry can contain. Bouquets of language that are my humble attempt at paying homage to my listening experience. But I wasn't always like this. Sitting on land and being in relation with land through listening unlocked that from within. My Signature Sound effortlessly flowed from within in the guise of poetry. I learned to pay attention to the parts of myself I had long discarded.
And as a result I remembered who I was.
Till next time,
Steve
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In conversation with a group of software developers last week the topic of everyone’s overall life satisfaction and happiness came up. For most the tone was mute. People were just chugging along.
During my turn of sharing I highlighted some of the things our family is going through, bit of flooding in our basement, water drainage issues, company communication issues, ongoing timelines, etc. but amidst that doing decent.
Someone said, “I can’t believe you could have that much going on and be doing decent.”
To which I shrugged and said, “It’s just a higher low. We go through the cycle of continuous challenges and triumphs, the goal to me seems to be not staying stuck in a loop but rather spiraling up and out, hence the higher lows.”
“I’ve never thought of it like that,” a friend said laughing.
I laughed too and said, “Me neither, but fortunately or unfortunately I’ve had the opportunity of experiencing a lot of lows and a lot of comebacks. So the goal became to just start making the pitfalls higher lows.”
Everyone kind of nodded, hemmed and hawed a bit.
“It’s all about struggling efficiently…” I shared, words I’ve heard from mentors like Jamie Wheal and Steven Kolter when learning how to induce, propel and cultivate our own unique flow cycles.
As a peak performance coach the first assumption of others is that the “peak” is all about getting “high”, optimizing, being our best selves, #LiveYourBestLife… And at times it is. There’s gotta be juice to get up and outta bed in the morning.
But the truth about flow and peak performance is that you have to get really good at struggling. You have to remember who you are, what you’re doing, where you’ve come from, who is worthy of standing next to you and where you’re going amidst each earth shattering low.
Some people call it character, rather the ability to come to know one’s true self when the sh*t truly hits the fan.
The struggle is where the juice is made. The struggle teaches one what they will and will not stand for. To lay boundaries, and sign posts for themselves and those they love. Our principles and values are etched into our psyche’s throughout these struggles.
Who did you love? How did you treat them? What did you give? How did you serve? All comes rising up when everything has boiled down to the bottom line.
Sounds pretty scary actually. I was only thinking of myself, I never gave an ounce of care to anyone but my family, I messed up….
And, it’s BEAUTIFUL. For these are the moments that we can grab the reins of our own redemption. Now, I think of others, especially when I’m hungry and give food away. Now, I treat so many families as if they are my own. Now, I realize the mess up, the low, and that it is the catapult for the greatness.
Do we need to locate our center? Or does it locate us through these moments of struggle and joy?
When I have conversations with people who intrigue me there are moments throughout the exchange that I feel ‘located’, “Ah I’ve been heard… They see me.” Not in a way of reflective listening, just repeating what I’ve said, but in a way that takes an honest presence of another. Feeling into themselves, listening within and listening without. It can be done! And, it takes practice.
When this type of listening lands, it’s like the Universe has answered a question I’ve been asking in a unique way that maybe only I would understand through another human being, interaction, place or space. Like a wink. A spark of light. A sign, synchronicity or convergence. Most times the people who connect in this way don’t even necessarily “know” they’ve done it.
Unless they are so in tune with their inner space that they know ‘something’ has landed. Something is moving, generating, and we are in a dance together. We don’t need to know why we are dancing, or necessarily what the song is, we just need to keep going.
In order to dance together like this, we need to practice and we need to step on each others toes. We need to step out of rhythm. We need to be given the space and grace to make mistakes, to bang our heads against a few walls, to say a few things that might not be meant to be said. To find the rhythm again, to dance by ourselves, with a partner, or in groups just for the sake of dancing!
These are the types of “mistakes”, misgivings and pains that used to demolish me towards inefficient struggle. “I can’t do it” “This will never work” “What’s the use”… on a silently repeated record vibrating throughout the back of my mind. But it’s like, knowing that we’re going to mess up. That things won’t go our way. That they won’t go to plan, IS a part of the plan, helps the struggle be more efficient.
A mis-step turns into a higher low, because my next step is right in tune again! I don’t feel sorry for stepping out of tune, I feel GRATEFUL. The course correction happens instantaneously and we are still going and this is a part of the dance.
I challenge you to give yourself the grace and space to have higher lows. To celebrate the moments of anguish, frustration, as a turning point, an opportunity to course correct. Become unafraid of these moments. And like a mentor of mine has said, “Do not be afraid of the dark, light a fire!”
If there’s one thing I wish I would’ve learned sooner or faster it would have been how to tread water amidst the struggle. To conserve energy, to not make things worse than they already are. Because hard times pass, we all get up for another day and we can get right back on the path we were charting anyway. That is, unless you’ve learned something new to shift it. ;)
Struggle efficiently friends and you’ll be the lifeboat you were always looking for.
Til next time,
Lara
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Hello Hedge School,
Are you in good shape?
Before you rush to answer. Let the words marinate for a while. Good questions require a period of courting. Beyond the literal lies the entertainment of a relationship. An opportunity to take a walk for a while. The quest invitation lies at the heart of every beautiful frame. Let the words fold back in on themselves. Slowly meander and take notice of all that is salient.
Be invited by questions.
So take my opening line. Are you in good shape? A rushed answer will refer to the state of our bodies. Or we'll try to reign in the muffin top that spills out over our jeans. The rushed response is a good start. But only a start.
If we sit with the question a while and repeat it over and over, the words start to move around. Start to shape shift. Nuances appear as curiosity takes grip.
What is a good shape?
Are we a shape?
What makes a shape good?
Am I inside the good shape?
Who judges the goodness of the shape?
Am I locked into one shape?
When I take this question for a walk, I start to think about my own shape. The shape that I have the privilege to embody. Uniquely mine. One people recognise as me, even if they haven't seen me for many years. This shape is my Pattern Integrity. A unique fingerprint. An essence. Distinctly me...whatever me is...a question for another time
So if I ask if I am in good shape, I start to think about integrity. Integrity, from the root word integer, meaning wholeness, has me thinking about all of me. All the nooks and crannies of the shape I inhabit.
Am I living into the fullness of the shape that I have been bestowed?
Have I been violating the shape that I have been gifted?
What part of this shape am I pretending not to know about?
What am I hiding away in the dark recesses?
As the question stews, rabbit holes appear everywhere. The mystery beckons. I can feel the need to satiate with answers but experience has taught me that answers are a dime a dozen. Staying open to the possibility that I may never bump into the "right answer" keeps me honest. The question is not a bucket to fill but a bucket to hold. An openness that keeps me curious. Keeps me honest. Keeps me in good shape.
So are you in good shape?
Till next week
Steve
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“What I have discovered more and more is that I have been given a gift as a human to connect through my heart.” -Joshua Lundell
“Please bring Ducky!!!” I’d call out to my mom as a five-year-old reminding her to grab the pastel lined baby blanket I always tucked next to my head before I fell asleep. She’d grab the blankie, cozy it up to my face and off I’d drift into Lala Land every single night. I LOVED that blanket. I loved Ducky. Ducky went with me everywhere, even college, until I lost my blankie when I was 20.
In 2019 I was sitting in the dining hall of 1440 Multiversity awaiting the new members of my boat crew #TeamNITRO for a live immersion with a group Josh and I are both affiliated with. Sitting at the head of a long wooden slab table I could see everyone clearly, three people to my left, four to my right… and then a human gliding across the floor, late to the party, but perfectly on time, pulling up a chair right next to me saying, “Hi, I’m Ducky.”
Joshua otherwise known as “Ducky” at the time was in the midst of a year’s long dream journal project. One handed to him by the Divine after a ceremony in Peru, guiding him with “You’re going to remember your dreams. You’re going to do it 1,000 times. You’re going to write a book. And you’re going to give that book away to the people you interact with in your dreams.”
Overall, he recorded 1440 dreams after starting on December 19th, 2017 combining every one of them into textual form and having them bound into two books called Constellations. Constellations allows the reader to journey through “the Aperature’s” dreams in whatever direction they see fit. Joshua followed through on that guidance, gifting us all with the magic of his journey through dreamland and back again. You can find your own copy of Constellations here.
Joshua and I sat down on Wednesday January 5th, 2022 to discuss all things How to be Human. Please enjoy our conversation.
Resources:
Zion Clark Instagram: @big_z_2020
Daily Energy Audit from Conscious Leadership Group (to move from Lack to Sufficiency)
It just is by Alan Watts (1:15:30-1:29:30 for a poetic description of beingness)
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Hello Hedge School,
It's been a while. A huge amount of gratitude to one of my favourite humans, Lara, for the gift of her prose, dulcet tones and pertinent inquiry. It brings me great joy to see a penned letter from Lara in my inbox each week.
Personally, I've unhooked the 'always on' trailer and taken a really long break.
I found myself wasted of words. Wasted of energy. Waste has been the dominant theme. A sick in-law wasting away. Projects decaying. Moments squandered through worry. Relationships dying.
The cycle of decay, compost for growth. All natural. All compost.
Compost has been a big teacher this year. Capturing our food and garden waste has schooled me about nature's relationship to waste.
“Nothing in nature is disposable. Part of the resilience of nature is that nothing in nature is wasted. The earth swallows it all through mouths or soil or water. This is such a simple beautiful truth. Everything is food, fuel, compost, a home for some other creature.”
Adrienne Maree Brown - Emergent Strategy
Nature wastes nothing. Think about that for a while. Now think about how much humans waste. Waste, from the Latin word "vastare" meaning 'empty' or 'desolate', is deeply woven into the fabric of human existence. Holes in the ground are filled with our squandered opportunities. We get wasted. We waste people. We squander more than any other creature on this planet. And it's part of the reason we are in the current climate mess.
So why are we so wasteful?
A few reasons spring to mind.
Our obscene obsession with hacking growth. Waste is the precessional side effect of fast tracking growth.
Our disconnected relationship with nature. We visit nature like we would a holiday destination, curate nature into unnatural landscapes that suit our taste and see overgrown forests as desolate.
Our infatuation with our own nature. We are too busy personal growing ourselves to pay attention to what we perceive as inanimate.
“How did the natural world become less real to us, more mundane and less sacred and beautiful? This is partly because we live so much inside ourselves, in a state of abstraction. Our experience of the world is therefore less direct and immediate. But this loss of vividness is also related to energy. Our powerful sense of ego — and our constant thought-chatter — uses up a massive amount of energy, and as a result there’s little energy available for us to use through perception. Our attention was switched off to the world around us so that we didn’t have to “waste” any energy in perceiving it. As a result, the world became an inanimate place to us. We no longer sensed the aliveness of rivers, rocks, and the earth itself. We no longer sensed the sentience of trees and other living things.”
Steve Taylor - The Leap
When I study my compost bin, I see aliveness and activity among the decay. Food waste, green waste, brown waste, all come together to decay with dignity. To surrender their animate. A passing of the guard supporting the new through dense nutrients. When I get the ratio right, I can feel the heat rise from the bin as it goes to work. Nature's alchemy at work. I also know the smell when I don't get the balance right. A deep lesson in tempering and balance.
When it's ready, I use my bare hands to work the compost into the soil. I feel it honours the journey. My hands gift the compost back to the soil. And nature's growth cycle continues on. As a result, our small waste bin, collected weekly, is never more than a third full and my garden is thriving in tribute.
What others perceive to be as waste is a resource.
“What we call waste, nature sees as indispensable building blocks for other processes. Waste is usually a lost opportunity that can be repurposed to restore balance to a system and produce wealth.”
Jay Harman - The Shark’s Toothbrush
Growth and decay are deeply entwined. We are always growing and dying. A tightrope of balance. A beautiful way to view this tightrope is Berkana Institute's "Two Loops" model. The Two Loops model highlights the need to "help a system decay with dignity so that the new system can emerge." Paying close attention to the death cycle is a necessity for systems change. We are usually too busy to take notice of the by-products of our growth at all costs approach to life.
How do we help balance the equation?
What do we notice when we pay deep attention to the death cycle?
The below video will give you a great introduction to the Two Loops model.
Waste is a resource. An expensive one in many facets. Reducing waste helped a little car company from Japan called Toyota compete on a global scale with monoliths such as Ford and General Motors. Reducing 'muda', the Japanese word for waste became a linchpin of Toyota's Production System. The creator, Taichi Ohno highlighted seven forms of waste and worked progressively to reduce or eliminate them.
Transportation
Inventory
Motion
Waiting
Overproduction
Over processing
Defects
When you lay Nature's methodology over this, you see lots of similarities.
Nature runs on sunlight.
Nature uses only the energy it needs
Nature fits form to function
Nature recycles everything
Nature rewards cooperation.
Nature banks on diversity.
Nature demands local expertise
Nature curbs excesses from within
Nature taps the power of limits.
There is tempering of new and old. Using only what it is needed. Recycling everything. Working within limits. Nature is marvelous at this. Of the elements available on the Periodic table, humans use them all, often with brute force. Nature uses four.
“Our current industrial growth society uses pretty much all the elements in the periodic table, while the fantastic diversity and complexity of life on Earth is by and large based on the low-energy intensive cycling of only four elements: carbon, oxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen. All other elements will eventually “run out” as we will not have the energy available to recycle them and separate them out from the composite materials and products we transformed them into with excessive fossil energy use, only to dump them into landfills shortly after.”
Daniel Christian Wahl - Circular Economies & Regenerative Cultures
Less but better. Nothing wasted. Nothing squandered. This truly honours with dignity the decay of the old.
Working with the Two Loops model allows us to make sure that we consciously balance the growth cycle, paying closer attention to the energetic exchange and the impact of our actions. Paying closer attention to decay of the old. Using all the lessons learned.
Honouring the animate/inanimate threshold crossing with dignity.
Lots of lessons to learn.
Till next time,
Steve
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Listen now | Grace in the form of life experience
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Short and sweet this week Hedge Schoolers. We are introducing the How to Be Human Invitation!
Whom do you admire? Who inspires you? Who do you appreciate? Have you told them? Have you gotten curious around the ways they live their life and what you might be able to learn? Have you sat down and gotten to know them a little better?
This season we are inviting you to give the gift of an interview, an email or even just a text to someone that sparks up when pondering these questions. Bonus points for sending a hand written letter or card!
Throughout the last several months of 2021 dancing with the How to be Human inquiries I learned it wasn’t “answers” that I was looking for. As it turned out the questions that came through when this journey started led me towards connection, intention and celebration.
For those wanting to step into this invitation a bit further, here is the full list of our How to be Human inquiries. Sit down with someone you admire, ask these questions and let the conversation roll.
May your holiday season be full of connections, intentions and celebrations as you lean towards those you admire. We’ll see you in 2022 Hedge Schoolers! Leave us a comment after you’ve reached out to the human(s) whom are your favorites. We’re looking forward to hearing how all of your How to be Human interactions go!
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It’s December and we’re in full holiday swing around here. Every year I “try” to slow down, bring some semblance to the activities I participate in, and voice intention for giving and receiving.
More times than not, it often feels as though I’ve failed. Time still moves fast. There’s always just a few weeks left ‘til gift exchange and I’m behind yet again. And to add icing to the pity cake I sure don’t feel much different than last year…
This is shadow talking.
As we bridge into our fourth question from the How to be Human inquiry list 4) What are easy reminders to be more human when some around us are walking and talking a little less human perhaps more “programmed/conditioned”…
My sense is our ability to navigate people, attitudes and places that don’t align with our highest values and goals comes down to how we navigate the sh*t, shadow and shame that arises in our very own lives.
“When the sht hits the fan…” is a common saying, and it’s true. Sht does hit the fan, and spray meticulously EVERYWHERE… Like the pipe that burst underneath my house this morning. Luckily it was just water. But ugh, honestly, I’m finding it hard even now to talk about this subject. Is it too dire? Why talk about the corners of despair or languishing in our lives?
Toxic positivity sometimes gets me twisted in my boots that if I even say the thing (sh*t), name the thing (shadow) or own the feeling (shame), then all I’m doing is acknowledging things that I don’t want and creating room for more of it in my life. Which is so far from the truth, but can still stop me in my tracks without a word to utter at times.
Sh……
This is how shame works. Shame shuts us down. Shame doesn’t take the blame. Shame moves and lurks amongst the shadows of the world. Those spaces we’re afraid to talk about or acknowledge. Those people that you know are out there but really want nothing to do with. They move under the curtain, without principles, only self-serving intention. And while sometimes these people may not appear scary, their actions can take down an entire operation. All because they are ONLY interested in what they want, not what is best for the whole.
“Shame derives its power from being unspeakable… If we cultivate enough awareness about shame, to name it and speak to it, we’ve basically cut it off at the knees.”
-Brené Brown ‘Daring Greatly’
How do we hold what we want AND what’s best for all? Because THIS is a surefire way to balance shadow. It’s also a surefire way to work with challenging shadow and being very solid and grounded with our values and principles when the sh*t does hit the fan.
I’ve had the pleasure of working with some masterful teachers, mentors, comrades and friends who I’ve observed working with shadow. Sometimes the collective shadow, sometimes their own shadow, sometimes even mine.
There have been some approaches where getting continually poked in those shame spots, moved me into action. I was so damn uncomfortable that I had to find my boundaries and vocalize “No more. No more pokes!”
There have been approaches where I’ve been held through the pain of working with shadow. I’ve been listened to non-judgmentally and guided to spaces of healing.
There have been instances where a person literally made me become my shadow through triggers and reactions. I became a living breathing walking and talking fear monger, stuck in a static state of my nervous system out of fear, protection and shame. For the most part, this person did not take my reaction personally. However, I did, because I was so ashamed at the projection I’d unconsciously aimed at them. It completely tarnished the beginning phases of our interactions. Which I worked to amend. Thankfully this person forgave me on the spot, because my sense is they know that how shadow moves is not always a personal game. But it doesn’t mean it doesn’t sting a bit. We can become conscious around shadow and therefore alter it in its tracks. Through a very slow moving process and constant challenges, this person helped me do that.
And then when the time came for another scenario in my life where my nervous system wanted to behave with projections enacting this same reaction I was able to be calm, to reach for support and to think clearly.
“Under pressure, you don't rise to the occasion, you sink to the level of your training. That's why we train so hard.”
-Anonymous Navy Seal
So, what helped the most? My willingness to be honest? To name the thing? Being surrounded by folks who were willing to enter “the dark” together?
I find that s**t, shadow, even plain ol’ challenges… have a tendency rattle one’s cage. And it’s not so much about how we get rattled, the practice can turn into how quickly can we return home? Home to a centered, grounded space of calm, where we can be aware and responsive. Which practice do we utilize? Breathwork, Exercise, Calling in someone in our support circle, Focusing, Praying, Asking for help? What is our most trusted resource?
And this seems like it comes down to how trauma has operated throughout our systems. For me, Trusting was the ultimate. If we all have light and dark inside of us, I didn’t trust that somehow your darkness wasn’t going to lash out and hurt me. This kept me solitary and isolated from other people. Which actually is worse than getting “hurt”.
I found that ultimately, I didn’t trust myself. The pain just always hurt too much. I didn’t trust that I would stand up and say something, I didn’t trust that I wouldn’t crumble under the pain, I didn’t trust that I wouldn’t react back with my own shadow or projection.
“Shame is the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging.”
-Brené Brown
Where it all stemmed from? Who knows, abandonment issues, generational trauma, religion, culture, gender identity, I mean I’m sure there’s many places to blame. And I’m not so sure that’s really the important part of any of this.
What is important is how we deal with sh*t, shadow and shame. Do we sweep it under the rug? Do we face it valiantly? Do we call it out? Do we ignore it? Do we even see, sense or smell it???
The masterful teachers I’ve witnessed somehow know how to alchemize, transform and recycle sh*t, shadow and shame.
When this capacity becomes available to you then every challenge becomes an opportunity for creativity, curiosity and action.
Sh*t becomes GOLD.
Do you know anyone in your life who can turn sh*t into GOLD?
“Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.”
-Albus Dumbledore
That’s it for us this week Hedge Schoolers! Talk Soon, Lara.
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Hello Hedge School,
As the words enter your ear, you feel a surge. A rise in amplitude. Your head nods in response. Body leaning in. Rising in energy as the transmission continues to rise in energy, each phrase has its way with you. A fluid dance where the timing is just right. Just perfect.
You feel the resonance.
Feel the rise in vibration.
As a student of deep dialogue, I have really tuned into my own resonant frequency. Tuned into what drives my natural frequency to rise.
You see, all things resonate...in some way. We have a natural frequency that we oscillate at. A note that is deliciously ours. When that frequency is met, energy is added to your system.
This is called resonance.
Anytime you have have ever nodded your head in response to something someone is saying or had a physical reaction to a song or an art work, you are resonating.
Resonance is "a specific type of motion, characterized by synchronized oscillation between two states."
Or simply "getting the timing just right, the frequency just right so that the energy you put into the system adds to the energy that is already there."
A swing is a great example of resonance in action. When we sit on the swing, there is no movement. When energy is applied via a push, we move. If one push was the only energy applied, we would eventually find our way back to stillness. However, when the force of a push is applied continuously, at the right time (aka when we are in the height of the backswing), more energy is added to the system. As more energy is added, the energy rises to the point that we don't need the push any more and the swing is in perpetual motion.
Dialogue is a place we can often find resonance. We begin on the swing, still but present. As the timing of the words reaches us at the right time and the right frequency, we find our energy rising. We feel our bodies needing to move. Head nods. Hairs standing on the back of the neck. Hand gestures. Excitement. Smiling.
The more energy added at the right time, the more energy added to the system.
This is a magical experience.
But the opposite is also available. Energy applied at the wrong time or wrong frequency leaves us waning in energy. Leaves us depleted.
Tuning into how resonance shows up in our bodies enables us to understand our natural frequency and how to charge our energy. It also gives us guideposts on what is energy depleting and how to design for better conversations, experiences, and presence.
Remember, you vibrate. And the more the vibrate, the more energy that is being applied to your system. This is why it is hard to stand still after an epic conversation or vision planning session. We have excess energy in our system. Ride the wave when you have it. Ride the resonance all the way to the top of your swing.
And then create ways to down regulate by dissipating your energy. This is where the magic of breath comes in. Always available. Always willing to rise up or down depending on what you need.
So tune in. Turn up your favourite song. Find the right frequency.
Let the energy build and as one my favourite song's from Rise Against goes, swing life away.
Till next week,
Steve
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I met Julie in February of 2019 amidst the majestic coastal Redwoods of California during a live immersion training to become a Flow Genome Project Peak Performance Coach. A few days in I saw this woman out of the corner of my eye, blonde, focused, yet somehow exuding tenderness. She reminded me of someone I knew, also reminding me a bit of myself. I just had to meet her!
Being the introvert that I am, it was going to take a couple passes of Divine Timing for that step to happen. We had a few interactions that weekend, of what I remember most sitting in the center of the Sanctuary, where all our talks were held, blitzed out from lack of sleep, wearing my bright neon pink beanie, she walked by and laughed directly while looking at me. I flashed a cheesy awkward smile sinking a little inside wondering ‘Was she laughing AT me???’ A few minutes later she walked by again closer this time putting her hand on my shoulder and said, “I really like your hat.” My internal voice, ‘Ohhh she likes my hat.’ Another voice, ‘But does she really?’ I ping ponged between those two questions for a bit then let it go. Didn’t matter, I liked my hat!
The next morning in the Sanctuary I noticed Julie was wearing a similar bright neon pink beanie. The sinking sense from the day before that I’d covered up with my own validation dropped down into my gut like a boulder hitting a target confirming, ‘Oh!!! She really DOES like my hat!’
Lucky for me Julie became my mentor for the next several months of the program leading our #TeamNITRO boat crew through very choppy waters. After our first interactions I just knew I wanted to learn from this woman. What exactly, I had no idea. So, I just kept showing up and listening. Which is a funny thing, because as a mentor there’s really not a lot of talking it’s mostly listening. So, I listened.
The mentorship turned into friendship these last several years for me because I decided to shed my introverted skin and keep reaching out to her. I had questions. Things I wanted to know about. Things I needed help with. And something in my gut was telling me that Julie had answers. We were aligned in several inquiries and conversed about a lot. Art, creativity, intuition, writing, feminine aspects, being soft and strong.
The special thing about Julie is she exudes the aspects of mentorship that one would hope for. She doesn’t want anything from you, and she’s capable of answering a question by wrapping it up and handing the very same question back to you like a gift. So, at the end of the day, it wasn’t her answers I was receiving, it was my own from a new unexplored space that I now felt safe enough to enter while she was around. My very own heart and gut.
I asked Julie to be a part of the How to be Human series because I’ve been absolutely floored by the ways she’s handled my inquiries in the past and was genuinely curious how she’d answer these questions.
Question 1: How to be human? And what is the best integration of humanness?
“It’s a tricky question because I feel like my understanding of how to be a human has changed as I’ve gone from child, to mother, to adult.”
“As a kid I thought that to be human meant, and it still is to some degree, that we were meant to be the stewards who take care of everything. Humans were the responsible beings on the planet, the caretakers. It was my understanding that we got intelligence and with intelligence came the burden. We had to take care of things.”
“And then, growing up I realized… Well that’s not the case, people use whatever they need and want and they’re not necessarily caring or giving back.”
“I’ve been listening to Braiding Sweetgrass (by Robin Wall Kimmerer). It’s a good book, I highly recommend it. It seemed like the Native Americans, particularly the Potawatomi tribe that Kimmerer is from, gave thanks for everything they took from the earth. And that seems decidedly human to me.”
I nod in understanding as she continued, “You know? Just understanding that, we’re here with a whole lot of other living things, trees, grass, plants, rocks, animals, and we can’t just take, take, take, we always should be giving back and giving thanks for what we take.
Again my understanding of being human shifted when I became a mother. I never wanted to feel like I had power over my kids. I was always trying to understand what they wanted or needed as little people. I often found myself saying, ‘Ok, I hear you and you need to hear me too.’ We co-created reality together, not their way and not my way. We had to figure out how to do it together. And I think that is very human and that’s what we need most right now!”
“Well then how do you give thanks Julie?” I asked her.
“…working in the garden barefoot and just being connected to the earth. And giving thanks to nature... for the clouds and the sun and the sky, the birds chirping, you know just being alive in a place that has aliveness around me.”
-Julie
“Recently, I’ve been working in my garden a lot, and really loving it. Being in my garden feels like it’s helping me feel more human and alive on this planet in a way that feels very natural. You know, going outside and working in the garden barefoot and just being connected to the earth. And giving thanks to nature... for the clouds and the sun and the sky, the birds chirping, you know just being alive in a place that has aliveness around me.”
Question 2: How do you think we can intentionally engage all humans to be more human?
She took a big breath… “If that was an easy question we’d be in a better place right now wouldn’t we?
I think good communication, good listening and actually trying to understand someone. You know, if you can actually listen to someone and try to get their perspective, then you’ve got a foothold for where you can say, ‘Ah, yeah I hear that.’ It’s the start of a connection... then, ‘That makes total sense to me and this is the way I felt.’ If they feel heard then maybe then they’ll reciprocate and listen to you.... Right? If they feel understood then they’ll try to understand you, and that could be beautiful. It sometimes feels like everybody just wants to argue and fight right now and say no my opinion is better and this is why you’re a stupid f**k!”
With that, we both busted up laughing, knowing this situation all too well. I wondered, “What do you do when someone is not listening? What if the other party just isn’t listening?”
“Sometimes people just don't listen and they don’t hear and they don’t want to change their opinion... that’s just that,” Julie responded.
Then she continued, “I’ve got someone who comes to mind who is old, and curmudgeonly and very set in his ways, and when he feels heard, it is defusing, it can take the spark out of his argument. And then you can ask questions or introduce something they may not have thought of. Like oh, ok but what about this? Have you thought about this?”
“There’s often something there underneath their opinions and if you can drill deeper for understanding it can be helpful and sometimes their opinion is all they’ve ever known. If they let you… you can share your opinion, grounded and with compassion. And feel free to add…’I hear you and that does not change my opinion of why I think this’... or you know, you could just say, ‘You’re Wrong!’”
Our laughing ensued again. I think we laughed our way through this entire conversation even though we were dealing with heavy and deep subjects.
Question 3: Who for you Julie are the best examples of being human? Who are they and what do their practices look like?
“I am a Montessori teacher, so Maria Montessori is a great example of an amazing human being. She was way way ahead of her time. She saw and treated children as intellectually curious little people. She set a course that has made lasting changes in education to this day. Which is fabulous. It was a whole paradigm shift on children and education and how children should be taught, that children are intelligent, that they are capable of learning and have an intrinsic desire to learn. If given freedom to learn they would actually choose it. Montessori learned how best to educate children by observing/studying children in a prepared environment. She’s been a powerful influence in my life and having that understanding of Montessori education definitely affected the way I raised my own children. I think we as people take whatever we got as kids as that’s that. Unless you upgrade your software, you’re running the same scripts as the adults in your life as you grew up…’sit down, shut up, do the stuff, I’m the leader, listen to me.’ I don’t think it needs to be that way. Kids can actually find their genius when they’re given the space to learn at a pace that is best for them. She was amazing.
My mom has always been an inspiration. She has always been a gardener. It’s one of the places we get to really connect right now. I’m finally finding a love and passion and time for gardening. We have long talks about gardening, and she knows the name of every frickin flower. It's amazing. She has so much knowledge there.
“Ooh, Alice Walker! She wrote the book titled ‘In Search of Your Mother’s Garden.’”
“Oooh I haven’t read it yet!” I said.
Julie said, “I haven’t read it either, but I love the premise. Everybody’s Mother has an outlet for their creativity, a garden, some place or thing where they cultivated their creativity and spirituality, and if we can find those places they reveal to us something about our female ancestors.”
Julie continued about her mother, “It’s nice to have that thing where we don’t have to talk about anything else, we can just talk about gardening and we’re going to connect.”
I asked next, “Question 4: What do you think are easy reminders to be more human when someone around us is walking and talking a little less human? Perhaps more programmed or conditioned?”
“Ah you know, I’m probably not as good as I should be. When I feel like someone is just functioning on autopilot… I just kind of,” she giggled putting a passing wave in the air, ‘Nice to know ya!’, But you know you can’t do that with everybody so I guess that’s where the word forgiveness comes in. When someone’s not behaving as human as they could be…
“Forgive them for they know not what they do,” I said.
Julie went on, “Yeah you know sometimes when people are just sleepwalking through life there is a bit of that.”
I felt deeply into this question describing, “For me, and I find that it’s that bridge of sometimes I want to reach out, depends on who the person is in my life. Where’s that boundary of being too much of an “out of control healer”. Yeah, it’s a tough one and I think the question for me stems from a place of especially when they are humans you have to interact with. You have to have a conversation with or you just can’t walk away. And what do you do? You know? When you’re not feeling seen, heard, felt, understood, and whatnot.”
Julie felt into the question too adding, “Yeah, I’ve definitely given some space inside some of my relationships when I haven’t felt seen or heard and where someone is just trying to push their version of story of an event or the way they experienced something that is completely different than what I might’ve felt. And I can forgive them for whatever happened but we’re not going to re-litigate this in a way that feels good to you if it feels shitty to me, you know.”
She added, “I don’t know if that answers the question.”
I dug a little deeper to describe the question a bit more, “I guess underneath that, what stems in the question for me is, “How do we wake them up? And I don’t know if that’s my responsibility to do…”
Julie agreed, “Yeahhhh, I know that’s a really tough one. I don’t think you can wake someone up until they’re ready to wake up… (with her eyes signaling down towards me like a wise woman bearing wisdom through the screen). And to say ready, meaning, maybe you can,” she waved her hand in front of the screen several times as though she was creating rows of something, ”You can keep putting opportunities in front of them, but, you know ...how much is that your responsibility? There could be 20 people over there (pointing off screen to the side) who are ready to wake up and you’ve kept your focus on this one person. And you know if these 20 people wake up that might encourage the one you’ve been working on to wake up faster than if you keeping knocking on that same fricken door.” We both giggled and laughed hard at this.
“Oh goodness, I feel that,” I said.
“That’s definitely something I’ve learned the hard way, you know, because I’m a giver so a lot of people have utilized my giving and I don’t even notice for a long fricken time. I’m just getting drained and drained and drained until I finally realize, ‘Ohhhh they didn’t ask for this, I just kept giving of course they were happy to receive it.’
Question 5: “Next question, and it’s our final one, How do I reconcile where I am with where I want to be with grace and ease?”
“Mmm, that’s beautiful. I think you just start every day fresh, you know? And self-forgiveness…” Julie responded.
“You said one thing in there, “Start Fresh,” How does one start fresh?” I asked.
“Start fresh by forgiving yourself for the stuff or the things you didn’t do yesterday, didn’t get to. You’re not beating yourself up for the... ‘Oh I have to do that today because…’ Start off with it’s a fresh day, I’ll do my best and if it happens it happens. Right? I know that I need to do it or I want to do it and it will happen. I’m not carrying any of the s**t from the day before that I was already beating myself up for not getting to it… Clean slate. New Day!” Julie exuded.
“What are some of the practices you utilize every day to start fresh and be human?” I asked next.
“Most mornings, I get up and I swim, and swimming feels like the most gorgeous fresh start to the day and no matter what is on my plate for the day... I get up with an alarm clock to go swimming. I get up to go swimming. Every day, the first thing in the water, in Austin, in an outside pool year-round ... it’s so refreshing. My morning routine is to swim or practice yoga.”
She continued, “And you know I have a breath practice and I have my partner practice. And I am becoming more consistent with my art... I would say that’s a practice, it’s just not every day cause other things get in the way. I just started a meditation practice but I do it before I go to bed at night, it’s a breath practice too, to down regulate my system before I sleep.”
We paused after asking and answering all the questions… then Julie turned the tables on me, ”So Lara, can I ask you what does it mean to be human?”
“Yes, you can… Hmmm what does it mean to be human?” I paused and closed my eyes. I really hadn’t looked at answering this question on my own yet…
Julie said, “It’s a hard question.”
I looked at her, “It’s a really hard question…” After feeling into it for a moment to see where my sense landed, “What it means to me to be a human… I think that a human is a receptive love mobile and the more that we can stay in that space of being able to receive love, the more we can actually give love and that’s when the connection, the communication, feeling seen, heard, felt actually happens. And if we all just got in that space of our receptivity and our felt senses and our intuitions we could communicate at least in a way that we feel seen and heard without even agreeing with each other. I think that would be the best space to be in. We don’t have to agree, but if we can at least have a conversation about not agreeing that would be really nice.”
Julie responded, “That’s beautiful actually. That’s really beautiful… My take away from hearing you say that is like before you have a difficult conversation with someone, you should probably ask, (and I know some people would be like that’s woo woo,) but ask them to take a couple deep breaths and really feel their heart. Feel your heart and come into this space... Feel it, and stay in that space while we have this conversation. Because, if we are human love-mobiles, if our purpose is to Love we need to stay in our hearts and not get hi-jacked in our fricken heads.. Come on back down into here.” Her hand grazed down the front of her chest toward her heart.
I put my hand on my heart too, “Yeah, it would seem to me that all my desires, or connection is filling some space in my heart or wholeness or somewhere in there that I think I’m lacking or have been fractured. And I feel like that would make it all better. You know coming into that heart space. It’s a lifelong learning process, and that’s my understanding of it as of now. Do I have it all down? Nope.” I giggled.
“Nor do I ...” Julie sing songed.
“Yay! Because I can not have it all down really well!” I exclaimed.
“That’s where self-forgiveness comes in... right?” Julie added.
“Ah yes…” I said.
Julie ended with, “Tomorrows a new day…”
Indeed it is, tomorrow is always a new day. I was surprised by Julie’s inquiry into my own questions. Although I probably shouldn’t have been, it was nice to hear myself answer the question. What is a human? And this here was an unexpected display of why I appreciate Julie so much. She gives me an opportunity to learn a little more about myself each time I’m with her. My hope is that I can impart a similar type of regenerative growth to all those I am with some day. My radical hope is that I already do just by being who I am, sharing my curiosities, listening deeply, and loving fully.
And this rounds out our final interview with some of my favorite humans about How to be Human during this very special appreciation week. Huge thanks to Julie Webster for being a part of this project. And a double thanks goes out to all you Hedge Schoolers tuning into this extremely full week of sharing.
May these conversations continue to inspire you to lean into and towards those humans who you really admire and enjoy spending time with. Until next time, be well friends.
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I came to know Dave Seljestad around 2005. During what felt at the time like the absolute worst years of my life. I was 150lbs overweight, depressed, and drunk A LOT. A functional a*e digesting everyone else’s grief and sinking under the weight of victimhood. Dave welcomed me into his arms as my Dad introduced us, “This is LA.” Dave immediately said, “LALA!” The childhood nickname I’d all but forgotten about. That kid was still buried somewhere deep inside me and looked up when he called my name.
I babysat his kids, three-year old Samsoni and one-year old Grace at the time. My not so maternal instincts didn’t kick in, but LALA sure showed up! There’s a thread line of trust so invisible but alive when someone trusts you with their kids. I may not have been maternal, but I was always 100% trustworthy.
“The relationship is part of the medicine.”
-Dave Seljestad
Dave always struck me, he’s a handsome part Tongan man, but it’s his personality that lit a spark of inspiration within me during those dark days. He was bright and optimistic even during the s**t he was struggling with. He could cry and laugh all in the same breath. I became curious how someone could dance lightly through the challenges of life?
One of my favorite aspects of Dave is that he is tough as nails, won’t let any b**t slide through the cracks AND is an empathetic, sensitive man who is not afraid to let the tears flow. It’s the most beautiful combination of aspects I’ve ever seen.
Dave and I became fast friends. I was drawn to his energy, his family, his kiddos, his dogs, and the way he lived is life. Years later, once I lost all the weight I was carrying I’m pretty sure the first time he saw me he bearhugged me and cried saying something to the sorts of, “I knew you could do it.”
I always felt safe with Dave. I am a deep feeler and learned that it was ok to be strong and sensitive. I started crying out of empathy and compassion, rather than for my own dramatic struggles.
After my Dad died, Dave was one of the first people I turned to asking for help. Up until this point I’d learned that independence, stubbornness and strength would be what would help me survive this world. But I just couldn’t hold it all anymore.
“What do you need?” he asked. I needed help to spread my father’s ashes as he’d asked on his death bed. “Anything Lala. You tell me where and when and I’ll be there.”
So we did. Dave, Samsoni and I spread my Father’s ashes together in his favorite fly-fishing spot on the Green River in Utah. Pretty sure that’s illegal, but we did it anyway.
After speaking with Dave about How to be Human, the word forgiveness stuck with me. He said something my Dad always said to me, but for some reason when Dave said it I was actually ready to hear it, “They’re all just doing the best they can. They’ll tell you one thing, or teach you one way, because they honestly think it’s the best way. You can’t fault them for that. And you certainly don’t have to listen.” And it’s true… As he spoke these words I saw cascading images of humans from my childhood, teens and twenties who tried to tell me things and how to live life as just honestly doing their best. A weight lifted. And it wasn’t my job to correct their wrongs anymore.
“You’re my family Lala.” Dave has said to me several times, and I have believed him, but I’m not sure it’s ever sunk in. After our call he said it again, “I’m not sure you realize, and this isn’t to be taken lightly, but you’re my family Lala.” I heard him again, opening my heart just a little more this time to feel the sense. Dave LIVES the mantra that family is thicker than blood.
Dave, What is the best integration of humanness? I asked him, “I simplify and prioritize lists in my mind. I think, and it’s hard for people to understand and sometimes they don’t get it, but I think it’s service.”
“It’s the ability to learn how to give without expecting something back. Being able to give and just the act of givingness you’re already getting something back.”
He continued, “If you and I have a friendship there’s no monetary means that is exchanged. You and I have a friendship, we both really need something out of it, Right? I’m giving to you freely because I love you and you’re smart and you make me feel good and we get the same back and forth from each other. You know and if you really start to pay attention to that, get into the habit of paying attention to that it’ll attract more of me and you in each other’s lives.”
“I think people overcomplicate things and it’s also human nature to survive and that’ the separation that exists whether it be a person to get a vote or get your issue across. Everyone wants to be a part of a group. And I do too! You know, but I want to pick my group and my group will not all be the same. It will be really diverse.”
“I’m trying to move through life with an open mind. I’m still learning as much as I can so I just try to listen and evolve and kind of understand that piece, like what can I do for people around me that deserve that help?”
“I feel like I behave like my mom and dad, so a lot of it is learned. And just kind of seeing what different behaviors do to people’s lives. Mostly subconsciously we’re all absorbing these things.”
“It’s not just service, it’s kindness too. They’re married, they’re connected. Why do I want to serve? Because I want to consciously be kind.”
-Dave Seljestad
“It’s not just service, it’s kindness too. They’re married, they’re connected. Why do I want to serve? Because I want to consciously be kind.”
“I don’t think you can change humanity as a whole but you can be conscious about where you’re spending your time, your thoughts, your energy and realizing how that effects the world around you.”
“The ripple effect has been over used forever, but it’s true. These sayings we run into in life, there’s a reason they exist, “Nature and Nurture” “It takes a village” I didn’t know it until I needed a village to help raise my kids!”
“I think the answer is to focus on what you can change, set an example and showing kindness and service… It slowly changes the world around you and just that multiplication of kindness, my hope is that it just keeps travelling.”
“When Covid first started and people began wearing masks it was scary! I tried to be even more human then, looking people in the eye, opening doors, being kind.”
“My path is just to affect the people in my sphere of influence and then figure out who needs to be in that and who needs to be out of that.”
It’s no surprise that when asked about How to be Human Dave referred to his family. More specifically his parents. Dave was raised by an LDS (The Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints) family in Homer, Alaska where his Dad was the bishop. Before this he was born in Washington state and adopted at 12 hours old, but that’s not any part of Dave’s story that matters.
“They were givers,” he said, “My parents. I was always so impressed by how the general public outside of that organization viewed my parents. It’s because they gave and they were kind, and they’d go out of their way to help people.”
“Yeah, the extra step to do the right thing for a human being,” I said.
Dave continued, “Another human who exuded giving was Lonnie Foster, your Dad.” Dave and I paused for a moment to hold the shudder of tears we’ve shared together since his passing in 2010.
“If there is another life I would hope that we were friends. But he knew how to give! Without expecting a thing back. He would give to people who just didn’t get a fair shake in life and he had the ability to look through that kinda hard shell and outer layer because of his experience in life.”
“That’s the real value. We can all have experiences in life, but what do we do with them? How can you leave a legacy on this earth without evolving and sharing and really wanting to identify what matters most?”
“And I don’t think he consciously thought, ‘what am I going to leave this earth with and who am I going to leave a mark on…’ He just, he looked for people that needed help, it’s like he was an angel. That’s what the definition is, they come into your life, they care about you, they love you and they kind of like alter your course a little. And that person’s life, just because of a little bit of contact, regardless of time frame, is forever changed.”
I think of all the people that surround me now. The ones that feel like angels. They remind me of my Dad. It’s an essence of non-judgmental attention and care, with an intention to help you take whatever step you need to take forward. And there’s never a sense of needing to pay them back. For me, I think the most we can do to “pay back” humans (or angels) like this is to become givers too. To carry the torch, to “be the light” and to give that same type of non-judgmental attention and care to those we come upon in our very own lives.
“He consistently did it. Especially in his world, my world too. We see really rough characters but he didn’t give a s**t about that. He looked through to figure out if they were worth sharing some life experience with. And you know, going forward maybe they didn’t always make the right decisions but that’s their evolution path.”
“He left a mark on this earth and just thousands, generations will be changed because of his contact. He just had a big heart and he loved to give to people.”
When asking Dave how someone could become a giver, “You’ve gotta learn to be in tune with yourself. Pay attention to your body and your emotions. And get to understand it like a pendulum. ‘Am I feeling good? Or am I feeling bad?’”
“Do you feel good? Do you feel happy in that interaction? We all have instincts that we learn to ignore. All of us. We have so much static and noise. But do I feel good in this situation? If it doesn’t make you feel good then figure out a way to move on.”
Talking about how to help someone learn to trust their own instincts, “You have to slowly learn… I learn through personal experiences and others experiences. So, if you can share an experience from your past that will help them understand the big picture and help them visualize possibilities, that’s how I do it.”
As Dave spoke I became curious how someone might learn to discern how to give appropriately without over-giving or becoming a doormat, “I don’t want it to sound like I don’t want to communicate or spend any time or help people that are takers. I’ll give a little bit. Sometimes just a little bit of contact can help change the course of their life. At least that’s my hope, show a little act of kindness and then I move on. I hope that grows.”
As far as protecting oneself, boundaries and perhaps another person who doesn’t know how to protect themselves, “I always taught my kids how to stand up for themselves, to protect themselves AND others. I’d say, ‘If you see another human being who can’t defend or know how to defend, then you stand up for them.’ I try to take the fear of “getting in trouble” away, in favor of doing the right thing.”
We moved on to the final question… How does one reconcile where they are with where they want to be with grace and ease?
“I would start the conversation and focus on where they are is where they need to be. And if you’re at this stage longer than you thought you’d be there is even more fuel to the fire of that’s exactly where you need to be. There’s something that you didn’t learn yet,” he paused thinking, “You don’t know what you don’t’ know.”
Dave went on to describe the inquiries along the process, “Let’s say you’re there at that step and you wanna be, I don’t know, a millionaire…
Why do you want to be a millionaire?
Let’s answer all those questions as we get there.
Why?
You gotta figure out the Why without stealing from anyone else’s literature.
Like, Why am I here?
What am I supposed to be?
Who am I here to help? Besides just myself.”
My attention wrapped right around ‘Without stealing from anyone else’s literature’… I felt originality, intention and uniqueness in those words. Celebrating how and why we are different, our only-ness.
“It’s just trying to breathe and be in that moment and accept that moment. That’s Grace right? I use that word a lot. And it’s the opposite of what people would think, in my world, I’m involved in martial arts, jiu jitsu, mma and wrestling and the people that want to get into it. Really, it’s understanding how to win and how to lose with grace. Now that can roll off my tongue real easy, but that is another thing to do! It builds character to be able to accept that. You have to have grace. What did I win? What did I lose?”
As we continued talking about life and where we want to be as humans in our own lives Dave said, “I don’t have an exact goal. And sometimes I can feel bad about that because everyone around me knows where they’re aiming and have these big goals. But for me, I can say… “ He paused and got real close to the camera looking straight at me, “I have a direction,” with a tone in his voice just a decibel lower than his conversating voice. “And that feels good. I know the direction that I want to travel. But I don’t have an end game.”
“Is that weird?” he asked me…
“No,” I said, “I think that’s, I think that encompasses a lot of who you are. And it’s your be-ing and your becoming, is a, is a… I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s almost one conglomeration of, it’s not a goal… It’s, you LIVE who you are, like I can’t even describe it! It’s like beyond words to. You’re the living manifestation of a “goal”. You have a purpose. You live your purpose through your service and talking to humans and being so eclectic with the people that you can talk to and engage with. And you can be tough and you can be soft. You are living the purpose. You are your legacy…”
“I’m trying… When you say all that I don’t think it matches me, but you know hopefully that means I can still try to be humble. But I’m trying to be all these things, but I’m human, sometimes I don’t do all of that. I really just try to keep coming back to home base and focus on the direction.”
With all of that focus and intention wrapped into a direction ultimately the question becomes, “What do you want to leave on this earth? The things that you can leave here you can’t buy.” Amen brother, Amen!
Huge thanks goes out to Dave Seljestad for being a part of our How to be Human Interviews. Stay tuned tomorrow to our final conversation for this round with Julie Webster. Until then have a beautiful evening or day Hedge Schoolers!
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Our How to be Human interviews begins with my friend Laura Hatch, Ables, GIBBONS!!! Yes, I have known her through each of these name changes and still call her one or all three. I met Laura in Salt Lake City, Utah when I was about 15. She was in her twenties and seemed “so much older”. Her laugh is one of my absolute favorite things and she’s a wrangler of other humans. She can bring oddball groups of folks together who would never hang out otherwise and make them feel like they’re at a 6th grade birthday party with all of their best friends.
In August 2021 I got to go hiking with Laura through the foothills of Salt Lake City overlooking the northern part of the valley. During our conversations I learned something new about her, she loves mountain biking! And as she put it, “I’m a beginner. I’ve been a beginner for the last eight years.”
The humility she displayed in this simple sentence made my jaw drop. And, now I know I really want to go mountain biking with her!
We sat down together for our How to be Human chat over a month ago.
“I fly by the seat of my pants Lara, you should know that.”
-Laura
Question 1: How to be human? What is the best integration of humanness?
“You know, that’s a good question actually, because I really I think you know me, I feel like you’re always evolving as a human. And I think you learn from other people. Just the different experiences you have with people and the relationships you form. Or even the experience of doing things like riding a bike or learning how to cook. Just all those fundamentals and I don’t think there’s any set things of “how” to be a human, but I just think that someone who learns along the way is better for it.
“I think you’re always evaluating yourself as a human and you can either evaluate negatively or positively or neutral! And I think as you get older you either get wiser, you learn from your mistakes, you learn from other people as you’re trying to be human. Or you take the example of people that are human in your life and try to be like that person.
“At this point in my life I think about, “What have I done in my life to impact my surroundings or the environment or the world, just people in general, I look to my parents who are really old now, they’re like in their 70’s and 80’s and I think about all the things that they have done.”
Question 2: How can we intentionally engage all humans to be more human?
“I think to engage, well it’s kind of funny, because my friends always say that my job in this world is to connect people. You know I guess I do that very well, that’s why I’m a recruiter. I think that anytime that you’re with people, is to engage people, to make them feel more human. To make them feel like they matter. To make them feel, hey someone cares about you.
Its quite interesting because someone told me, I randomly texted someone and I said to him, ‘Do you feel like I’m annoying you when I text?’ And he said to me, ‘No, I feel like when you text me it’s you saying ‘Hey I’m glad you’re my friend! I want to be your friend!’ And that really hit home to me. I was like oh, ok so that makes sense.
My son Michael just took Cotillion. It’s where you learn manners and how to have conversations. So, I said, ‘Oh with Covid now, how do you greet someone?’ And he said, ‘Well you don’t shake hands anymore because people have germs.’ So I said, ‘Ok well what do you do?’ And he said, ‘Well you smile with your eyes and you put your hand on your heart, like Hi!’ And I was like hmmm that’s really interesting. And it’s interesting when you look at people with masks on that the people who smile do light up! And the people who don’t smile you can tell when they’re not smiling, you know?”
I totally resonated with this sentiment from Laura saying, “That IS interesting! There is a gentleman that I walk by in my neighborhood and he always walks with a mask on. And if he’s on the same side of the road I make sure I cross the road so he has the space. He’s elderly, maybe 70 something. And every time that I pass by him, he puts his hand on his heart and does a little bow… And I feel it! Every time! And I feel, not like welcomed, but grateful like thank you to him for thanking me. You know?” We both himmed and hawed at the beauty of this gesture.
Next I asked Laura, Who inspires you in your life?
“Throughout my life I have been blessed with people that have been good mentors for me. Have picked me up when I think life is a struggle and saying ‘You can dot it!’ Or ‘This is what you need to learn.’ Like that. One example would be your father, Lonnie Foster. He was one of the mentors that I could go to him and ask for advice.
I think me as a human, with my background, you know being adopted twice, in the foster system, and having so many people at a young age be a part of my life, as I’ve evolved I feel like the people that really inspired me I started borrowing from them, like I wanna be like this person.”
“You know one thing that my father always told me is, ‘You know people say they don’t have choices, and every day you do have a choice. You have a choice whether you can be happy, you can be sad, you have a choice of whether to work harder’ Or whatever it might be he would just be like, ‘Always know that you have a choice.’ And my father is, my adopted father right now, is one of the people that really has helped me to be a good human.
“When I think of human, I think of personal touch, personal relationships”
- Laura
I remember when I was little and my parents were, I went from a Catholic family to a Mormon family, and I remember having a hard time with my life at that time. I was in middle school. And I just remember a church leader that took me under their wing , and I’d be like I just don’t know who I am, what I need to be.. And, she just really helped me.”
“One time I said to my therapist, ‘I don’t want to be a mom.’ I never wanted to be a mom. I never thought to be a mom. And she was like why? And I said well, because I’m terrified to be a mom. I’ve had this experience, I’ve had this experience and this experience. And she said to me, ‘What if you could take all the positives, the things you like about those experiences and you can create to be your own mom? The way you wanna be a mom?’ and I was like hmmm… that definitely made sense.
I am blessed to have Peyton, my daughter who’s in college now, she would also be another one that’s very inspiring to me. I think she taught me a lot to be an adult. I have a very childlike personality. I don’t always know what the reality is. And I think my husband is another good one. Jim is someone that I’m like I wish I could be a little stronger like that. I wish I could be more realistic.
And I just think that’s the one thing I try to do is integrate myself with people that have really inspired me or that I look up to.
Everybody has st in their life, things that they have to go through. Everybody has challenges and one thing I’ve learned through the years of growing up is that your st is no better than someone else’s st, or your st is not worse than anyone else’s st. Everybody deals with their st in their own way. Sorry to keep saying s**t. J But you can’t compare yourself to other people.”
Question 3 continued: What are the practices of these humans that inspire you?
“I hear this a lot from people. You should always think good intentions of people instead of thinking the worst about people. To always think good intentions, that they’re trying to make good intentions. I also believe that you should be selfless and helping people. There’re two rules at our house that we follow with our kids, we’re not very strict. And one is respect. And one is honesty. And those are the two rules that we have. It’s really important to respect other people. And be kind. People don’t like people that are mean. That’s something that I strive to be kind even if people are mean.
Question 4: What are easy reminders to be more human, when some around us are walking (and talking) a little less human? Perhaps more “programmed/conditioned”?
I went on to continue my interpretation of this question, “To me being more human is being able to have your own perspective and being able to listen and empathize with another perspective regardless of whether it’s toward the same view point as yours.”
Laura added, “Whenever I see something that is like people are just more robotic, or really negative, I try really hard not to get sucked into that. And it’s kind of hard sometimes. I have to remind myself why I’m doing something and why I like it. My husband is a good reminder actually, to be honest. Other people remind me.”
Her words reminded me of Simon Sinek’s book Start With Why, “Oh I see, so really getting grounded into your Why…”
“Yes! And You can use books! You can use music! Some downtime, I’ll even listen to classical music or I’ll listen to Christian music. Those are things that kind of pep me up. My children remind me. Michael, I have this 12-year-old that I’m responsible for and I have to be a good example. And if I’m negative all the time he’s going to be negative all the time. And if I’m positive he’ll be positive. And that saying of show by example and not teach by words, it’s true!” Laura exclaimed.
Question 5: How do I reconcile where I am with where I want to be with grace and ease?
“I think it’s important that you figure out what you want. What’s the outcome that you want? And how are you going to get there? And getting there you have to do it in a positive way. You have to do it so you’re not demeaning yourself. You’re not demeaning anybody else. You also value who you are and not letting people walk all over you. Or whatever it might be.
Something that’s helped me is that I have a goal in mind. One time I went through a period where I wasn’t happy. And I was like I want to be happy. And I had to figure out how to be happy on m own. So, I would write notes actually and I would put sticky notes on my wall. And my daughter does the same thing it’s kind of funny and I never told her. She writes notes to herself and it says, “You are worth it” “You are worthy” “You matter” “People like you.” And, that really helped me I think to get me through that period.
I also think that you rely on other people. People that have gone through it. Like teach me about forgiveness. You’re really good at forgiveness. Teach me that. Or how are you able to forgive so easily?
Write down what do you want to do? What do you want the outcome to be? What are the things you can take steps on? That you’re capable of now? You can’t tell someone the steps they have to take. They have to kind of figure that out in a way of their own in a sense. You can guide them and say, ‘This is what I would do,’ but it’s not so much like that, it’s important to ask, ‘Is this something you would do?’ And a lot of times when people are making decisions I always tell them. Make a list. Write down the positives. Write down the negatives of it. And write down the things that you want out of it. Because I think people forget about what they truly want. You can always write down the positive and negative, but I don’t think they always write down internally what they want or how to get there.
And you need to know you’re not going to get there immediately. You have to be patient with yourself. It’s an evolving thing. It’s not something you’re going to do overnight. And you have to do it as a habit. Like forgiveness, or whatever it might be. So that’s what I would recommend to people.
And I’ve always had this belief, go to people who are professionals at what you’re trying to do in life. Whatever it may be. Because maybe they can give you an insight that nobody can.”
I wrapped up our conversation sharing my takeaway from what Laura just said, “Know what you want. Treat yourself well along the way. And ask for help from the experts. Boom!” We had another final giggle together after this.
Sitting with Laura helped me remember to anchor into my Why… who or what is my Why. Directly after we spoke I felt so solid about who I am and where I’m at in my life. This sense of leaning on the Why stayed with me for days after our chat.
Huge thanks to Laura for being a part of the How to be Human Interviews. Stay tuned tomorrow where we share our next deep dive with Dave Seljestad. Until then, stay cool Hedge Schoolers!
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This is going to be a treat Hedge Schoolers! I have been just anxiously awaiting the week I get to share parts of the wonderful conversations I’ve been having with some of my favorite humans.
In order to fully experience the fullness of Question 3) What are the best examples of being human? Who? And what do these practices look like? from our How to be Human list I reached out to some of my favorite humans from throughout my life. We explored How to be Human together, their thoughts and experiences through their own lives, explored who inspired them most and weaved through a few recurring themes.
We are coming to you a few days early to let you know that new posts and fresh episodes will be coming to you on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this appreciation week!
During this week I’ll present to you from the long list of people I wanted to interview, three very special humans in my life. Why did I choose these three? Perhaps proximity of hearts, timing of scheduling, and honestly intrigue for an array of perspectives.
On Monday we get to visit with Laura Gibbons whom I met in my teens. On Tuesday we touch bases with Dave Seljestad who I met in my 20’s. And to wrap up the week on Wednesday we share our sit down with Julie Webster who I met in my 30’s.
This week we’ll be bridging hand in hand across the inquiries of every single question from my “How to be Human” list with each of these humans. We’ll get to learn how they’ve approached life and living, growing and being a human. Who they’ve learned from, and what types of practices they utilize to keep being the best humans they can be.
During these conversations I found myself reflecting on the words they shared. These humans said a lot of the phrases and quotes I’ve heard before from others in various walks of life. Like, “You don’t know what you don’t know” “The ripple effect” “It takes a village” and more.
For some reason the phrases are landing different this time. I’m really hearing them with what feels like an open nervous system. I am listening fully and deeply without expectation. I am honestly and truly giving my full attention and in this giving I received a gift. The gems are LANDING!
These conversations are in depth. Feel free to read or listen along. A part of me wished I’d recorded the interviews in a way that could be replayed for all of you here via video, but perhaps that’ll be our next project. Whatever you do just be sure to give yourself time and space to hear and sense the gems sprinkled throughout these connections.
In appreciation of these humans, and all the wonderful humans in my life, I wanted to share some of the practices that have helped me on my own path. Writing happens to be one of those practices. I’ve been writing off and on for over 20 years now.
So why do I write? I write in appreciation of the words and messages that come through beautiful conversations and connections like you’re about to see. To allow them to continue, so that someone else may hear the wisdom that always rings true, but is capable of actually landing in a time and a place when they are ready to hear it, to feel it fully and to let it expand.
This feels as though it is my gift of giving. This is how I continue to appreciate and love the humans around me. As you’ll hear on Tuesday, maybe Dave’s words, that he might’ve heard from my Dad or his own Dad don’t land with his kids now, but perhaps if I say them, someone else will pick them up, one of his kid’s friends or parents and the message will still be delivered to someone he loves EXACTLY when they need it most. Talk about the ultimate web of support!
It’s not something you can always see. They’re internal bursts of realization. Unless someone shares their experience with you, you don’t always know how your words or what you’ve created lands. So, I live in the space of radical hope that my words, my sharing of experience are at least riding the waves into and beyond this web of support. I put them out there and let them set sail. And as for the rest? We let the Great Mystery handle all of that.
This type of expanded reciprocity, where we’re all working together for the greater good, through our lives, our experiences, our thoughts, our feelings and wisdom is just such pure gold. THIS is what I live for ya’ll. This is what I love for. And this is what helped me to let go of trying so hard. Effort for the sake of efforting is a waste of energy. Giving attention with intention is a gift.
May you all enjoy this appreciation, holiday week. May you find yourself able to reach out to someone who you admire. And may you hear the words you’re needing to hear the most through this beautiful web of support exactly in the moment when you’re needing them.
Enjoy these conversations Hedge Schoolers and let us know what you think about How to be Human!
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Hello Hedge School,
While I've got you...
I've heard this phrase so much that I always joke it should be my legal name. Sure, tt is a turn of phrase. A colloquialism that honours a physical reminder. But sometimes it is much more. When you truly take in the words, the language is off.
There is a boundary crossing. An infiltration, often accompanied with an ask.
Before we know it, an energetic withdrawal has been made through felt obligation and corner backing. And it often happens before you realise it.
In the past, I've always agreed too quickly. Not taken the time to truly assess the priority of their ask amongst the priorities I currently juggle myself. It can be hard to say no. Hard to push back and say that you cannot assist at this particular time. But sharp boundaries are needed. Especially by those who have none. Aiming to please is often done at our own cost. A path that often leads to being walked all over. That often leads to resentment.
Sharp boundaries are a clear constraint.
A clear delineation between inside and outside. A scoping if you wish.
Sharpening the lines is a reclamation of power. A reclamation of integrity. Clear boundaries helps others understand what you value and prioritise. People respect clear boundaries. They indicate clear intent, values and mutual respect. This is what I will do and this is what I won't.
It may mean a few awkward conversations at first but everyone will benefit in the long run.
How to do this
This is not an exhaustive list but a list of strategies I use frequently to ensure clear delineation.
Let people know you have a hard stop at a certain point of time at the start of a meeting or conversation. Most people will honour that. Honour that yourself by sticking to it.
Change your time defaults. Parkinson's Law states that work expands to fill the time we've allocated, so allocate less and getting punchier with your expectations. Set meeting times to 15min for short items or 30min for longer. Get really clear on purpose for meeting and calls to actions. Change your defaults on your calendar/email client on a system level to take away the need to remember.
Get clear on your values and make decisions from that place.
Yes/No Trading. When you agree to one thing, drop another. One for one. I'll trade an inconvenienced colleague for a happy son/daughter any day of the week. A yes to one thing is a no to something else. Always.
Permission to engage. This one is connected to email and social media. Be intentional. Email, as the old adage goes, is someone else's To Do list. Before you open your email client, pause. Are you ready to engage with the asks of others? If not, work on your most important priority. Deep focus will follow if you choose to get locked into your most important items.
Create default responses. For me, I put the ask back on them. Have you logged a job? Or have you checked the FAQ? Or have you spoken to those around you? People see you as the solution to their problem but it comes at a cost. Flying in to save the day makes their day easier but only in the short term. Remember, whoever is doing the heavy lifting cognitively is doing the learning here.
While I’ve got you…choosing to engage in the perusal of this transmission, I wonder what other strategies there are for setting really clear boundaries. I’m building out my boundary toolkit. Sharper lines = sharper constraints = clarity and creativity.
Till next time,
Steve
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Hey Hedge Schoolers! What a trip this journey of inquiries into How to be Human has been. We’ve explored what it means to be a human, integration, connections, and our only-ness. I’ve been busy behind the scenes conducting interviews with some very special humans to share with you all in the upcoming weeks.
Today’s episode will be a pre-cursor to our very special contribution going live during Thanksgiving week in the United States. Granted the politics of Thanksgiving, how it started, and why we celebrate is alive with reasoning for continuing up for debate… I’ll be focusing on gratitude and appreciation as a whole specifically during that week and this entire month of November.
My understanding of gratitude has shifted over the years from just saying ‘Thank You’ for a gift, to being grateful for a blessing, to really observing and allowing the felt sense of appreciation to vibrate within my being for a moment in time with another human being or another space and recreating this felt sense by revisiting the scene again and again. Phew! That was a mouthful!
It was Dr. Joe Dispenza that turned me onto observing and melting into these senses. In his book Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself: How to Lose Your Mind and Create a New One he asks you to imagine a scenario that you’d like to create. When I read the book years ago I felt stumped. I’ve always been a dreamer with a high visual capacity to “see” and “dream” things up. My mind can build a lot. So, What did I want to create? Well, I could build a house, I could build a farm, I could build a community, I could build a gym, I could create a manuscript, I could write songs, I could create great relationships, I could create groups and teams… My mind took over and I just couldn’t choose amongst the wide array of possibilities.
I put the book down for a good long while, years actually, and headed another direction. There was something about embodiment that I needed to learn. Even though I’d been an athlete and really physical all of my life, I needed to learn how to really be IN my body. To feel, to breathe, to notice my own heartbeat, to feel safe, to move grounded with each step. Conceptualizing embodiment doesn’t do much. We can talk all day about it ‘til we’re blue in the face, but really ya gotta get IN. You gotta practice. Like, What does my heart say when I am with this person? How do I feel on the inside in this scenario? Am I breathing shallow or am I breathing deep? Am I absolutely scared out of my grits with this human? Why? Are they really scary? Or am I believing a projection?
I dug my heels in DEEP. Learning my own nervous system and chemistry through breath work, observation, meditation, journaling, walking, conversating and just being. I started to understand the basic nuances of my system and where I might perhaps be able to shift and change things. Leaning into living the questions of, Where am I happiest? Where do I feel calm? What or who feels grounding to me? What freaks me out? Where do I not feel safe?
It’s been such a JOURNEY!!!
As I learned to feel and sense into my own embodiment, the union of my essence inside my body, not just in my head or outside of myself, I started being able to really pay attention to the people around me with presence.
And this is where the appreciation comes in. Once I really dropped into my body and stopped listening to the noise of my mind I was able to sense who I felt my best around. While I could not figure out exactly what I wanted to create years ago, I did realize that I wanted to vibrate in the appreciation of these special humans that I could feel in my nervous system.
So that’s what I began creating. More time, more moments and experiences with these extraordinary people. Why? Because I feel really really good around them. My nervous system quiets, my breath relaxes, syncopating with another human’s heartbeat, we are connected, we can essentially be in flow together. Co-creation at its finest for the simple act of just being.
Now, we could go the theoretical route and take a turn into poly-vagal theory introduced by Stephen Porges. Of what I understand poly-vagal is the space of emotional regulation with another human being. Their nervous system is so calming that yours immediately responds and adjusts to their timing. There’s no thought to any of this, it just happens. Like the way a parent can sooth a crying baby. The baby responds to the nervous system of the parent.
Once I noticed this occurring I leaned in further having few memories of my nervous system ever being so calm before. Perhaps the memories were there underneath, but perhaps they were also layered with learned hypervigilance, stress, tensions, and unresolved traumas.
I finally found what I wanted to create! More spaces and places and people whose nervous systems I calmly responded to. Whether they were responding to me, or I to them, doesn’t matter. Calm is Calm. And as Dr. Andrew Huberman says, “The optimum state for a human being to be is calm and alert.”
There’s a certain set of values and principles that take place within these humans. It’s like their intentions are aligned with mine or at least with the greatest good. They take responsibility for themselves and their lives. And they create the most they can with what they have. “Do no harm and take no s**t.” They are quietly, unassumingly, humbly inspirational! Like a whisper that you can’t detect at first but if you keep listening can become the only voice in the room centering attention.
These are the humans I allow myself to feel fully with, and they are not all the same kind of human. They do not all come from the same place or have the same ideals. They do not look the same. In fact they exude “Only-ness”. They are unique and that’s what is beautiful about all of us connecting through our uniqueness.
I found what I love. And as the song above Blue Rose by Skrux says, “If you love it, then share it.” I found myself through these humans at varying points in my life. The list of these humans could go on and on. But I’ve chosen three special humans to me to dive into our questions of: What are the best examples of being human? Who? And what do these practices look like?
In our next episode of How to be Human we go deep with each of these individuals. Not only do we get to learn how they do human, we get to hear some of their own responses to the entire How to be Human list of inquiries. This is a TREAT ya’ll! Each conversation has gems of remembrance. So, stay tuned to our next episode in two weeks where we go deep on appreciation with our favorite humans.
Until then, I’ll leave you with wondering, Who are some of your favorite humans? Who would you want to sit down with? Who do you love dancing with? Who would you ask the question: Can you tell me How to be Human?
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Hello Hedge School,
I've recently felt the call to share more publicly on social media. To speak my own truth. To hear my own voice. This yearning comes from a deep desire to share my own story. For so long, I have been a proxy for the stories of others. The shapeshifter in me harnessing and reflecting the energy of others. But lately, I've just felt the call to speak alive the words I write all the time.
Attentional Thumb Wars
My relationship with these platforms is a cagey one. I, like everyone else, has lost many an attention thumb war to scrolling. Boredom. Voyeurism. Genuine interest. They all play a part. But the most contentious area for me has been yard-sticking.
What do I mean by this?
Social media causes me to continually compare myself to others. This poem I wrote after catching myself in a doom scroll gives you a sense of the feeling I'm left with. I know I'm not alone.
When the mirror tells lies
I see the nothing in no thing
The return I yearn,
gives me no hope.
In desperation,
I seek to hold it all together.
But a filter
of non truth,
stumbles me in comparison.
I can never compete with
the thousand masterstrokes
of illusion.
Instead,
I stand.
Staring,
with no love at all
for the shape I hold in life.
I see this in my kids. As their consciousness comes more online, I see the inhibitions, shyness, and feelings of enoughness that come from comparing our hand with others. As a teacher, I get to see that further exacerbate as the teenage years take hold. The online identity is not merely an extension. It often IS the identity. With all its trickery of filters, angles, and behavioural validation, a social profile can make or break a teenager's existence. It is a sad state of affairs, and one that the big platforms need to take some responsibility for.
So why the shift in my relationship.
It's simple.
I am the only me.
Like Lara said so beautifully last week, we are united in our "only-ness." If I speak truth in the moment and honour my only-ness, maybe it will connect with others who need to feel that truth. To speak their truth. This, I can report, has been the case. I am not speaking to get followers. I am not speaking to sound like I know what I'm talking about. I am simply honouring the truth of the form that I live in. The words that leave my mouth are my song. A song only I can sing. As a shy kid who usually cowered from the spotlight, I just said f**k it and pressed the live button. I couldn't edit the video. I couldn't add anything to it. I could only surrender to the moment. And surrender I did. My shares resonated with many people. But not with everyone. I'm ok with that. But I breathed air into my story, shifting from lurking (man, we need a better word that) to being witnessed.
Comparison will always be a part of these platforms. But the world does not need clones.
The world needs you to step into your own truth and sing that song. That seed is already inside of you waiting to come out.
"The shape that waits in the seed of you to grow and spread it's branches against a future sky."
David Whyte
So I will continue to share videos on socials. To tune my vocal cords for singing. I'd love to witness your song, so press record and sing it to the world. Let's unite in our only-ness.
Till next time,
Steve
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A friend of mine disappeared. She went silent. Dark :30.
I know the move, I know it well. Too much is happening. Change, chaos, something hurts real deep. Unable to hang, we retreat.
These retreats inward were not so productive in my earlier years. Sparking depression, negative downward spirals of thinking, and lots of alcohol.
I reached out. To her. For her. For me.
“Where are you?” I asked and “We miss you.”
I suppose in my moments of darkness, these are the words at times I wish someone would have said to me.
My friend came to light through these words, “I’m here… “ she said, “Life just threw me a few curve balls.” Pausing, “And I suppose I retreated instead of reaching out. I’m not used to having a place of support.”
What if we had a space where we could retreat within AND retreat without into and through our support networks?
Sometimes our curve balls seem so unique that no one will understand what is happening for us. I’ve found over the years when I say the thing, really say it out loud in a group of trusted allies, there is ALWAYS a thread of connection and support.
David Goggins, you gotta love the guy, he’s overcome so many mental and emotional hurdles with a knack for pushing through extremes, says in his book Can’t Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds, “I learned I was the only. The only black person. The only poor guy. The only this or that…” (I’m paraphrasing here)
As I listened to the audio book driving down the Pacific Coast Highway on the west end of the United States towards the Redwoods in California it donned on me. I am “the only” in so many situations. The only gay person, the only athletic person, the only creative, the only linear thinker… on and on the list could go.
And you are the only woman, the only man, the only mother, the only orphan, the only agent of change… The only one who understands… Perhaps we are all connected through our “The Only – ness”.
I am not the only only in the room. I am ‘the only’ with ‘the only’ you.
Reaching into our question this week for the How to be Human Series: How can we intentionally engage all humans to be more human?
Maybe with one simple question: What is your only-ness? Where are you ‘The only’?
Let’s connect through that. Let’s hold and support one another.
And then tell me about those connections. Who held you? Who supported you? Why are you grateful for them?
I don’t know that there’s necessarily a Jedi move we’d be able to unleash that will intentionally engage all humans to be more human other than just BEING human ourselves.
“There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.”
-Leonard Cohen
It’s a two-way street. The wound is the thread line of hope. Our vulnerabilities and grief can lead to connection and joy. And broken hearts can open a world of possibilities, new friendships and delights.
Perhaps this question: How can we intentionally engage all humans to be more human? is more of an internal job. We make the choice to share who we are, where we hurt and are fractured, not in hopes of healing, not in hopes of connection, but rather because we are human and this, this being human, the acknowledgment of our essence is where we can really begin to create.
So, it is upon me and upon you and you to intentionally engage ourselves to lean in. To listen deeper to that pulsing beat in our guts. A rhythm so sweet it cannot be muffled.
I had a conversation with a new friend last week. Her name is Judy Clarke. She is a Mindful Self Compassion Coach with a background in psychology. She taught me the simple essence and difference between empathizing and compassion.
Empathizing means you identify with another human’s story. Which can be great for perspective taking, shifting while making someone feel seen and heard. Although it also reinforces “the story”.
Compassion means you recognize another human’s moment of suffering without over identifying. You can, “put your hand on your heart and say, ‘Ah, this is a moment of suffering. May I be kind to myself in this moment.’”
Try it. It just feels different. Like a warm, enveloping, blanket of love. And perhaps if I’m feeling this way, feeling kind to myself in this moment, maybe you might feel inclined to be kind to yourself in this moment too.
Maybe our ability and/or willingness to recognize another human’s moments of joy, triumph and suffering compassionately is the direct engagement for us to be all of the wondrous, confusing, delightful, distraught, cherished human being’s that we are.
And so it is.
Our How to Be Human Series continues fortnightly in two weeks with an absolute treat as we share conversations with some of our favorite humans on this earth. Until then, let’s all just try to be as human as we can be Hedge Schoolers. Lara out.
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Hello Hedge School,
The brother in me died when my baby brother left this world.
Being a big brother was a gift bestowed to me. As a shy kid, it was the only role I felt at ease in. A signal that pulsed directly from my heart. I followed that signal often.
Into education.
Into coaching.
Into quiet counsel for those who needed patient ears and genuine curiosity.
My younger brother Aidan and I were compadres. Dressed as always by our mum as twins, we were peas in the pod. The same but different. Close in age. But destined to pull apart in search for our own space to hold. A space to stand eye to eye.
Man to man.
My sister Linda and I have always had a special bond. The podium dance partner. The shoulder to cry on. The test subject for her Doctorate experiments. She is a powerhouse with a heart as big as this world.
With four and a bit years separating us, we grew together. Life milestones charted in close proximity.
And then there was Kev.
Seven years age difference. I had a front row seat to all of his great adventures. He was, as all who met him knew, an old soul. The beauty in my relationship with Kev was that he let me play the big brother role full out.
Kindred mischievous spirits.
I taught him how to shave. How to use fake ID to get into clubs. How to play basketball. How to stick his finger up. Time well spent I say.
He taught me how to be sure of myself. How to be fearless. How to be a big brother.
So when he died, I couldn't hold the weight of being a big brother. Being in that energy hurt too much. Memories too raw so I pulled back. I felt this in all the spaces that I held. As a teacher. As a coach. As a father.
Like a forest burned to ground with wildfire, blackened char crumbled underfoot. Previous growth felled to the ground.
Torched with the ferocity of grief.
I etched this darkness into my skin. Black tattoos, skin etchings of hurt scorch marks of flagellation. Lament, a dark fragile landscape.
But even in darkness, beauty grows. New shoots, a tribute to life's love of cycles. Those etchings have grown into a three quarter sleeve.
New trees. New flowers. New water flow.
A tribute to the cycle.
That cycle has led me back home. Back home to the role that I had previously run from.
Brotherhood.
Grief would lead me to containers where I hoped to find him. And find him I would. In the eyes of brothers from other mothers. Men who reminded me of him. Men with the same cheeky smile. Men who would teach me to stand in the hurt of it all. To let it wash all over me. To not only cry in hurt, but laugh, sing, and, dance.
To sit in the magic that was bestowed upon me.
The only calling I was ever sure of.
Brotherhood.
Being a big brother.
That calling has kept on tickling my ear. His way of nudging me back to standing in my sovereign duty. To be the patient ears that hear the dreams, woes, snags, and songs that we all carry in our hearts.
And so I have crossed that threshold.
And as my feet touch down on the other side, I look back. But I can't see him. I can only feel his love in my heart. A love I'll always carry.
A brother's love.
It is this love that envelopes this invitation.
An invitation to brothers. From other mothers. To sit in circle with me. Leaning into the edges of weight we all carry. The calling we hear in our hearts.
To be warriors. Warriors of the heart. Shambhala Warriors.
No "hardening up."
No "manning up." Just acknowledgment.
And by acknowledgement,
I mean the original meaning,
‘to confess’.
To confess that we don't have the answers. To confess that we feel lonely. To confess that we aren't always present in our lives. To confess that we are anxious about the world. To confess that we need support. To confess that we feel lost.
And all of that truth is perfect.
And all of that truth is not just ours to hold.
Others feel it too. For we are not alone.
I have done this work. For the past two years, I have sat in circle twice a week with brothers from all over the world and confessed. Spoken about my relationships. Spoken about being lost. Spoken about my celebrations. Spoken about my relationship with the sacred feminine. And in this container, I have stood quietly as other men have done the same. I have held the space with patient ears and big brother energy.
I am forever different as a result.
Beginning the first week of November, I open a Circle for brothers. A fractal of the Shambhala Warrior journey that has gifted me for the last two years. This Circle will be a year long journey to acknowledge the truth of where we are in our lives.
It is called the Shambhala Warrior Brotherhood.
The best news is that I don’t lead this by myself. Three dear brothers are also leading a fractal of this brotherhood into the world. The calling is to provide better spaces for men to speak beyond veneers and projections. Spaces for men to speak alive deep truth.
Potent medicine.
For those dear brothers in Hedge School, I invite you to take a closer look if this feel right.
Or edgy for you.
For those dear sisters in Hedge School, please pass this on to any dear brother who you feel would thrive in a container of deep truth and support.
You can find out more information at the below link.
Respond with any questions to this email.
This offering marks the one year adventure of Hedge School. A weekly cadence that reverberates across the world at the same pace every week. I’m deeply honoured to hold your attention for a little while. Deeply grateful.
As always, from my heart to yours.
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Last week was a treat. An opportunity to breathe in the deep inquiries of my dear friend Lara. The words tangoing with my eyes. The sounds serenading my ears. As the song of Lara's inquiry sung its way into my heart, I found myself in the liminal space between doing and being. Witnessing the urge to do or be. It was here I noticed the fractures that lay within. The internal compartments I had created over time in response to life's lacerations. As the liminality buoyed me, I found myself drawn to this inquiry from Lara.
What is the best integration of humanness?
There are so many nuances to this question. Firstly, I only know one version of humanness.
Mine. Biased and limited. But solely mine.
The word 'best' jumped out at me. Part destination. Part journey. Also neither.
But the word that drove this question home for me was integration. It implied that I was fragmented. And I am. Often. I'm fragmented when I am out of integrity. I've written about integrity before. Integrity, from the root word integer meaning whole, is how we live into our full shape.
Our complete form.
So why are we fragmented? Why do we Humpty Dumpty ourselves?
In part, protection. A shield from trauma. From grief. From life.
In other parts, projection. Mimicry as a means of social integration. As I watch my kids grow, I notice when they start to notice their differences. Yardsticking their biological hand against their peers, they start to shift away from natural tendencies. Shift towards assimilation. The tectonic plates slowly drifting away from oneness.
We talk openly about fiercely protecting our uniqueness but maybe fragmentation is a part of the process of growth.
Carl Jung would say fragmenting is when we lose touch with ourselves. A form of suffering where we forget the magic of our uniqueness for a time. Jung called the process of collecting the pieces and reassembling them 'Individuation'. Through individuation, we come back to ourselves.
But we must first suffer.
Suffer the divisions.
Suffer the realisation that all is not well.
Suffer the process of coming back to wholeness.
So if it is unavoidable, what does our relationship with suffering look like?
In her book, When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times, Pema Chodron explains that suffering should be celebrated. For not celebrating means that we only fear. We resist. We go against the grain. Suffering is one of the three truths. Along with Impermanence and Egolessness, Suffering is a truth of life. We were born through the suffering of our mother. We suffer in death. Not celebrating means that we only honour half the experience. For the suffering of our birth was greeted with both pain and joy. The suffering of our death is both pain and joy.
So to begin my integration, I have to start with my relationship to suffering.
Where am I gripping with white knuckles?
How am I holding on to constructs and narratives that don't actually exist?
It is here I practice renunciation. A practice I learned from Pema Chodron. It is a practice of inquiry. When I can't stand to face what is in my path, can I investigate why I'm going against the grain in the first place. Can I let go and trust that impermanence will flow as it needs.
Effortlessly. Consciously. Surrendering.
Suffering is how we grow. It is how we fracture and fragment.
And how to come back to ourselves again.
Till next time,
Steve
Image Source: https://unsplash.com/photos/mC852jACK1g
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Hello Hedge Schoolers! I’d like to introduce myself. I am Lara Foster a Web Developer by day and Peak Performance Coach at all other times. I met Steve at the initial coaching cohort of Flow Genome Project’s live immersion in the Redwoods of California in 2019.
I’ve been reading or rather listening to Hedge School presented by our dear Steve Brophy since it’s inception. He’s been posting articles every Thursday like clockwork!
One Thursday a few weeks ago Steve paused his writing to inquire from listeners ‘What questions walk with you often’? Which immediately struck a chord. He also asked if anyone would be interested in contributing to Hedge School?
I raised my hand for both.
Steve’s inquiry came at a time (Summer of 2021) in the midst of several personal life altering transitions (perhaps we’ll cover some of those in this series) and the ongoing worldwide saga of COVID-19.
As soon as I heard Steve’s inquiry, I rattled down the current questions that walk with me often on a pink post-it note.
1) How to be human? What is the best integration of humanness?
2) How can we intentionally engage all humans to be more human?
3) What are the best examples of being human? Who? And what do these practices look like?
4) What are easy reminders to be more human, when some around us are walking (and talking) a little less human? Perhaps more “programmed/conditioned”?
5) How do I reconcile where I am with where I want to be with grace and ease?
Steve and I had a fun jam about these inquiries and his desires for Hedge School, to grow the platform, engage more writers and readers with revolving articles about various subjects. So here I am! I’ll be contributing the How to Be Human Series to Hedge School and we’ll dive into these questions together.
I’d like to start by saying I know ZERO of the answers to these questions. Only that, these are the ones that walk with me currently. This unravelling will be completely new to me. With my writing in the past I’ve always had an intended destination point. There is no such point here.
At most I’d like to create the space for all of you to inquire and hold these questions in your own life and begin to share your experiences with us all.
One of the highlights of my conversation with Steve about these inquiries was riffing about how interesting we are as humans! Our lives, our experiences, our perceptions, our feelings, our gifts, our misgivings and how this kaleidoscope of uniqueness shifts with every lesson learned and decision we’ve made.
The last 18 months have given prime opportunity for all of us to unveil and see how we are operating in our very own lives as humans. What values and principles we hold, how we shift and adapt, who we listen to for input, and what or who is the ultimate authority in our lives.
I’ve found that the answers to these questions can be surprising. A lot of folx act one way and when it comes to a line of loyalty, trust and hope for the future might just pull a 180 degree turn to flip the script in their favor. I can’t blame the folx or even myself for pivoting and shifting in these tumultuous times. What I can try to do is get very curious… by asking questions like: Where is this coming from? Is there something I’m not seeing here? What is the most grounded action step I can take?
Humility and humanity ultimately become our vector points. I do not pretend to know it all. Only to be curious and engaged with these questions living at a time when I hope most of you are also engaging these types of conversations.
Over the next coming weeks we’ll approach each inquiry that sparked alive when Steve asked ‘What questions walk with you often’, one by one. I have no idea where the road will lead us. But what I do know is I am happy to be here.
Until next time…
Be well Hedge Schoolers!
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Where are you going in your path in life? Do you have a vision sharp in clarity or are you stuck? Maybe you are snagged on indecision. Maybe you only see mist covering the path ahead. These crossroads can be hard to stand still in. While sight is absent, you harbour a knowing that there is something greater calling out to you.
I've been in that mist many times. It is only on reflection that I can see clearly. These times have often led to my greatest breakthroughs. My greatest growth. In past episodes of Hedge School, I've written about Ariadne's thread and the clues that lie in our past and how Janus, the two-faced God, can assist with helping us move when we can't see at all. Be sure to check those episodes out below for more detail. There is magic in looking back.
The foresight of hindsight
“I’ve learned an important trick: to develop foresight, you need to practice hindsight. Technologies, cultures, and climates may change, but our basic human needs and desires—to survive, to care for our families, and to lead happy, purposeful lives—remain the same. To understand the future, you have to look back at least twice as far as you’re looking ahead.”
Jane McGonigal - Reality Is Broken
Looking back over lives gives us a sense of our wake in life. The past provides clues to moments of aliveness. The aliveness of younger days. When working with clients, I spend time digging into their Flow history and Play history to help chart the wake of their lives.
Where in the past have you lost yourself to the magic of flow or play?
Where were you?
What were you doing?
Who was there?
What were the conditions like?
Are the activities that provided such moments still present in your life?
The process of turning to face our wake is not solely about reminiscence. The clues are part of a recipe of aliveness that many of us have forgotten. And the value lies in sensing our essence. Sensing our Signature Sound. The magic that speaks through us when we surrender to who we truly are. The flame of this aliveness like all beautiful fires needs tending.
It needs kindling.
Needs air.
Needs stoking.
And we do this by sitting in the chair.
Sitting in the Chair of Aliveness
Writing for me has been alive in my bones for as long as I can remember. Books were magic carpet rides to far-off adventures. Creative writing, my modality of choice to bring to life the wonders of my imagination. Language inspired understanding and creative expression. I am forever an apprentice to this craft. I have dedicated myself to doing the reps required to improve. I wrote 750 words a day for two years, with a bank of over 400,000 words a tribute to learning. But the greatest gift is that I still feel alive when I write. There are far-off worlds that I yearn for but I love the process. I love sitting in the chair. The words are a tribute to that aliveness. Many of those 400,000 words are on the cutting room floor, leaving artifacts that make me beam with pride. But also leave plenty of room to grow. I've found a way of speaking through the scratching of my pencil or dances on the keyboard. I am enchanted by the magic of showing up regularly each week to share from my heart. I write to you but not for you. I write because I can't not.
My clues helped provide the hindsight foresight needed to help the mist clear. The space required to tune my ear to sing my song.
So what foresight does your hindsight provide you?
And how can you apprentice to the magic of that?
How to Be Human series - launching next week
My original vision for this humble newsletter was to create a space for co-creation. It makes my heart sing to see that original vision come to fruition. Beginning next week, a dear friend of Hedge School and of mine, Lara Foster will be co-creating a Hedge School series called "How to be Human" with me.
Lara is a Peak Performance Coach | Software & Web Developer who I know through the Flow Genome Project Coaching program. She is an epic human being who writes at Lala's Life Garden, sharing the day-to-day experiences of continuing to live a life in and through flow, connecting to fellow humans, and continuing to adapt with every oncoming challenge and awe-inspiring surprise.
So starting next week, the magic of Lara's prose and dulcet tones will be gifting your inbox as we weave penned letters about the human experience. I'm so excited to see where this goes and I encourage any writers within this beautiful community to reach out and throw their hat in the ring. Hedge School is your platform also. Reply to this post if you are keen, all are welcome.
So till next week beautiful humans,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Many of you will be familiar with the ripple effect. The impact of a stone dropped in water moving outward disturbing the once still surface. According to Wikipedia, "a ripple effect occurs when an initial disturbance to a system propagates outward to disturb an increasingly larger portion of the system." As human beings, we are both the stone and part of the system that is impacted by the stone's journey to the bottom. We, through our actions, words, and sovereignty, impact those around us. Others, through their actions, words, and sovereignty, impact our way in the world. This is the magic of relating. We are a whole, and part of the whole. The reverberation of our actions leaves an imprint on those we relate to.
We can only speak truthfully to our inner experience.
The outer experience of our shape is for others to shed a light on.
Our legacy is for others to carry forward.
Legacy, from the root word 'leg', means "to gather words". The legacy of the words that others gather in our memory. A bouquet of language in tribute to our ripple.
My brother Kev moved as a 17-year-old to Savannah, Georgia to follow his dream of playing Division I College Basketball. He passed away at the age of 21, so the last four years of his life were viewed from afar. We lived through second-hand information. Lived through his version of events and news articles. When he passed, his true ripple effect came to life.
People shared stories of his work ethic. His ability to always see people, no matter what social ranking they had. His patience. His dedication to pitching in and playing his part, even in the face of adversity. The ripple of his stone in the waters of others gathered so many more words to contribute to his legacy.
There is so much power in the way we meet the world. How we live into our relationships and the words others choose to represent that ripple effect.
What words would others gather in your honour?
It is beyond voyeurism. Human beings ripple in the waters of others. Wield the power wisely.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Latent within every relationship is the possibility of it ending. The bridge built between two people can and will crumble. The hopeless romantic within hopes the deathbeds of old ears hear these words but the reality is that the work is the work is the work. Relationships fracture over time. The complexity of life and the intertwining of human needs, wants and desires will always apply pressure. While many work at collaboratively patching the holes. Many don't. Many see their own b**t reflected in the tears of a lover. Many can't hold that, so don't. Relating to another human being is hard f***g work. It comes with all the colours of the rainbow. A bounty of beauty. A torrent of hate. And everything in between.
I'm writing this week in honour of my wife. A fierce lioness who shoulders the weight of our world.
I'm a work in progress.
I can have my head up my own ass.
I can take the easy road.
I can half-do things.
I can be passive-aggressive.
I can shun responsibility.
I take full responsibility for all of these things and more.
A work in progress
My relationship continues to be the most amazing learning experience of my life. A mirror with magic in the reflection. Tension. Love. Truth. Powerful ingredients for a great relationship, generating the required pressure for transformation. Dark nights of the soul can threaten the end. It has to be that way. But the sun does rise the next with magnificent splendor if we trust and surrender. The bridge between two souls stronger. Investing in each other requires deep surrender. A willingness to give up positioning in exchange for unity. To lean into each other to create a bridge that will hold. Lockdowns have pummelled the bridges between many of us, causing the patched-over fractures to bear often insurmountable damage. The rise in domestic violence is a horrible truth that all is not well under the roofs of many. Relating requires work. Inner work. Outer work. Bridgework.
The Shakiness of the Long Bag
Robert Bly calls our shadow "the long bag we drag behind us." Our first twenty years of life are spent suppressing our wholeness into the dark corners of this bag. When we show up in relationships, we always have work to do. We always show up dragging this long bag. Our partners shine a light on and into this bag. Such action can trigger us. I know it has for me. Seeing that which I have suppressed in the bright of light can often be too hard to bear. The weight of the load causes me to shake.
In her beautiful book, When Things Fall Apart, Pema Chodron calls for us to stay with this shakiness.
“To stay with that shakiness - to stay with a broken heart, with a rumbling stomach, with the feeling of hopelessness and wanting to get revenge - that is the path of true awakening. Sticking with that uncertainty, getting the knack of relaxing in the midst of chaos, learning not to panic - this is the spiritual path. Getting the knack of catching ourselves, of gently and compassionately catching ourselves, is the path of the warrior.”
This is hard. I know I've found myself weaving stories that circumnavigate the shakiness to suit my own rhetoric. But integrity is all of me. And if I am to be truthful, not all of that is pleasant to wear. To grow the bridge in strength and surrender, I must be brave enough to face the fractures of my own doing. To turn and take a look within the long bag and stay with it.
Everyone wants transformation. But transformation is done in the cauldron. It is alchemical. It is how we transition. It is the unknown. The deep work. And it's not easy. We earn our stripes. We earn the transition. According to Ken Wilber, there are two options here - transcend and include or slip back to the known. Forward with a new skin or back to the comfort of the known.
So I pen cathartic words with trembling fingers. The work is the work. Love lacerates. It must. And I lean into my edges and stand in my shakiness.
As a work in progress.
From my heart to yours,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
I've come to know the five kilometres around my house really well. 200+ days of lockdown will do that to a person. The streets. The paths. The wildlife. There is a depth to my relationship that was not present before. My ear, locally tuned to the patterns of my area sensed Spring was afoot a few weeks back. New buds, a shift in the patterns of local animals, and a rise in sun height signaled Spring's eager early start. This has been the silver lining of lockdown. While I pine, like others for the liberties beyond the five-kilometre radius, I have come to revere the area that I live in. The boundless amount of beauty available if I just adjust my aperture to take it in.
Beauty
“A start is to broker communication with beauty. Beauty is created not just by desire but by diligence. By circling again and again like a hawk round the well to what truly sends you both dizzy with admiration but also utterly focused in service. Be mastered by beauty is what I'm saying. Be defeated by it. Rise to it in the weepy faithfulness of your response.”Martin Shaw - Courting the Wild Twin
Communing with the world around us has so many benefits. Opening our aperture to the wonders of the world takes our breath away. It leaves us in awe. According to Sturm et al, awe is defined as "a positive emotion elicited when in the presence of vast things not immediately understood and can help reduce self-focus, promote social connection, and foster prosocial actions by encouraging a “small self." I much prefer Shaw's poetic explanation of awe as "something that sends us dizzy in admiration." Awe reminds us just how big and beautiful the world is and helps us appreciate the smallness of our place amongst it. How our small self meets the beauty of the infinite universe we inhabit.
Awe Walks
While the world is awash with heavy energy, awe is always present. Always available. It just might take some practice reacquainting ourselves. Awe walks are a beautiful practice to help tune our senses to the magic available with every step in our local area.
"Awe Walks are different. We walk mindfully. Our focus is outward to the natural world. We walk slowly, tuning in to our senses. We're inquisitive and curious adopting a gentle awareness to the physical world. If something strikes us as interesting we inquire, not to get an answer, but to get a deeper sense of its reality. A fuller experience. Its "moreness".Fraser Dean - Awe
In simple terms, we walk like a five-year-old would. With whimsy.
Try it for yourself and see what marvels you uncover. I guarantee you there is a world in your backyard you haven't seen yet.
Be dizzy in admiration for the beauty that lies at the edge of your aperture.
Till next week,
Steve
Awe
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
In a world that is screaming divide across algorithms designed to polarise, we have been drawn into a shouting match where the only play is to drown the other out with volume, fact warfare or groupthink.
There is a better way. But swords must be downed first. We are not the enemy. Ideology is. Constructs are. At a biological level, we are the same. Homo Sapiens. Born with the beautiful gift of making up our own minds. It is this gift we must protect. This gift we must honour in others.
This breeds diversity.
Diversity helps ecosystems thrive.
Diversity promotes innovation.
Diversity matters.
So your choices are yours. I honour that. Honour your ability to carry them out as you please. I may not agree. That is my choice. As warriors of the heart, we must acknowledge the sovereign right to make our own minds up. But must also remember that our minds are often just made up.
Waking up in our Reality Tunnel
My worldview is biased. Narrow. Culturally linked. Localised. Stating it any other way would just confirm the bias. I do my very best to broaden the view by spending time in the shoes of others, listening with open ears, and walking curiously with deep questions. A search for better questions.
The further I walk, the more knowledge I come to meet. The more I know, the more uncertain I feel. The dissonance stills me. Provides a halfway meeting point for the world of the adjacent possible to show up. Being in this uncertainty is challenging. A desire for some semblance of control can lead to our boat anchoring in certainty.
But certainty comes with bias.
I've written before about certainty and its role as the eternal trickster. Polarity is not two poles. It is a continuum where degrees matter. The weather is more than hot or cold, it is degrees along a continuum. A united continuum. Unity is both hot and cold.
“Unity is plural, at minimum two.” - Buckminster Fuller
Only zooming out shows us this. One cannot exist without the other.
The challenge in our current intense timestamp is seeing the bigger picture. While the intensity of the moment can feel like forever, it is but a speckle of time across our landscape. Zooming out allows us to see and honour the long game.
We are a community of Homo Sapiens.
We are Spaceship Earth, as Buckminster Fuller so beautifully framed it.
Our home is the same home. It is this bigger picture that can provide what Dr John Demartini calls the "Astronomical vision." A vision so big it incorporates all of us. Such a vision can help us rise above the present ideological warfare and "stretch our mind across time." We can honour the past and rally for the future. For a world with a future needs a world to inhabit. No matter your view on the climate crisis, you can appreciate the fact that this is our home. And this home has felt the impact of human progress. Felt the impact of a disconnected relationship. Earth is not an endless ATM for progress. Its treasures are finite. Awakening to this prepares us for the Great Work.
The Great Work
“The Great Work now, as we move into a new millennium, is to carry out the transition from a period of human devastation of the Earth to a period when humans would be present to the planet in a mutually beneficial manner.”Thomas Berry - The Great Work
Being present to the planet is a call for relatedness. An opportunity to step back into a role we have long played. Caretaker. Caretakers with a gift to time travel between multiple pasts and futures. Caretakers with gifts to feel into the hardship of others. To think beyond ourselves and our biological programming. To imagine and create another way forward.
To stretch our minds across time.
“Stretching the mind across time—even in the most speculative ways—can help us become more responsible planetary stewards: It can help endow us with the time literacy necessary for tackling long-term challenges such as biodiversity loss, microplastics accumulation, climate change, antibiotic resistance, asteroid impacts, sustainable urban planning, and more. This can not only make us feel more at home in pondering our planet’s pasts and futures. It can also draw us to imagine the world from the perspective of future human and non-human communities—fostering empathy across generations.”Vicent Lalenti - Deep Time Reckoning
Zooming out enables us to do this. Holding multiple realities in our minds enables us to do this. In these times, it is this skill that can also give us an opportunity to rise above the tumultuous seas of a moment and see the bigger picture.
To connect to the greater mission.
To unite for the Great Work.
For the world is not us vs them. We are degrees on a continuum. A continuum that is in relationship with the greater world we inhabit.
“We cannot doubt that we too have been given the intellectual vision, the spiritual insight, and even the physical resources we need for carrying out the transition that is demanded of these times, transition from the period when humans were a disruptive force on the planet Earth to the period when humans become present to the planet in a manner that is mutually enhancing.”Thomas Berry - The Great Work
My worldview is biased.
Biased towards a worldview.
I'm missing pieces. But my heart is open to listening, learning and uniting.
From my heart to yours,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
I speak often of nature as a master teacher. The more time I spend sitting in nature, the greater the depth. Much of that growth comes from a dreaming I enter when I return to the same places. As I court the spaces I hold dear, I am more attuned to the patterns that appear there. I notice with a greater depth, the differences, the growth, the highway of life ebbing and flowing around that particular space.
It truly is an altar for me. A deep spiritual practice.
Biomimicry
This communion has led to a real interest in the application of nature-inspired learning or the field known as biomimicry. Dr. Janine Benyus, the author of Biomimicry and co-founder of the Biomimicry Institute, defines biomimicry as the "conscious emulation of life's genius. Innovation inspired by nature." Nature is a master creator and humans have been mimicking this genius for as long as we have existed. For this week's inquiry, I'd like to delve into the world of biomimicry and share some of the resources and learnings that have blown me away.
A canon of laws, strategies, and principles
In her book Biomimicry, Benyus outlines the following summary of nature's principles for design. These guiding principles can help us be better adapted to the world we live in.
Nature runs on sunlight.
Nature uses only the energy it needs.
Nature fits form to function.
Nature recycles everything.
Nature rewards cooperation.
Nature banks on diversity.
Nature demands local expertise.
Nature curbs excesses from within.
Nature taps the power of limits.
The above principles are unpacked beautifully in this video by the Biomimicry Institute.
Ask Nature
Another amazing resource from the Biomimicry Institute is the Ask Nature repository. Broken up into Collections, Biological Strategies, and Innovations, the Ask Nature library is an ever-expanding curated collection of nature’s wisdom.
Collections - Learn how nature sustains communities, deals with stress, manages water, and much, much more.
Biological strategies - A curated list of 1700 functions developed by living things to apprentice to.
Innovations - See how innovators and entrepreneurs have used the lessons learned from nature to generate new and innovative solutions and products.
The Biomimicry Toolbox
If you are not sure how to apply biomimicry to your life, the Biomimicry toolbox unpacks the concepts and methods of biomimetic design. Explore Earth’s Operating System, learn how to put Nature’s Unifying Patterns into practice or upgrade your design process with the Biomimicry Design Spiral.
The lessons we can learn from nature are endless. Tuning our senses to the world around us can lead to innovative solutions, poetic inspiration, or communion with something bigger. There is much to learn if we choose to open our eyes to the wonders and possibilities.
Be curious.
Walk with childlike wonder
See with open eyes the marvels that are all around you.
Nature is a master teacher.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
A huge thank you to those who replied to last week's inquiry. Tom, Shebbie, Lara, and Bart, you have gifted me much inspiration this week and provided a sharpness to the vision I have for Hedge School. More to come on this in the coming weeks.
For this week's inquiry, I'm speaking to the power of community to hold us in these tumultuous times. And these are tumultuous times. Times with an edge that is cutting many deeply.
So when the strain of the weight we carry threatens to crush us, where, who and what do we turn to for support?
This episode is dedicated to the spaces, places, and people who have held me when life has threatened to swallow me whole.
Shambhala Warrior
At the start of 2020, I was two months into being alcohol-free. Covid was looming but no one could foresee the impact that it would bring. The absence of alcohol stilled the waters of my own mind and provided tremendous clarity. But with that clarity, came a comedown. The GABA pathways of my brain desensitised over time due to regular drinking struggled to reset. This led to anxiety and the dark clouds of depression. My amazing doctor flagged this as a journey I would need to travel through and recommended finding a community or coach that would help hold me. Jiro Taylor was the first person I thought of. Jiro has been a constant companion in my own personal journey over the last five years. I called him straight after that appointment for the possibility of 1:1 coaching.
But he had bigger plans...as he always does.
Those plans were Shambhala Warrior, a brotherhood of men dedicated to becoming the Elders required to help this world move through these tumultuous times.
I have been in that container ever since speaking my truth to a community of brothers who find themselves at the same crossroads in their lives. The truth found in the tilling of my own soil has led to a deep remembering. A deep remembering that I came to existence in this form with a mission. A mission to help guide souls through the dark times of their lives, to stand up in their own grief, and to speak alive the songs that reverberate in their bones. When Kev died, I sought the embrace of my brother in every experience I chased myself through. And Kev always led me to brotherhood. He always led me back to Jiro. Back to brotherhood. To the energetic role, I was born into. And found myself in. A big brother.
Each week I speak with brothers from across the world and am brought alive in the sincerity of speaking to men who do not dismiss my gentleness. Men who see me as a soul who lives to see others. I am forever grateful that the Universe nudged me with subtlety towards this beautiful space. I am forever different. And dedicated to wrapping my arms around brothers who look to stand up in their lives as creators, fathers, sons, husbands, partners, or whatever role calls their soul alive.
Flow Genome Project - Kokoro
Jiro came into my world through the exploration of flow. The state where we are completely merged with the magic of moments. The times where we forget all we hope to be and just merge with the experience of being. Exploring Flow led me to Jamie Wheal and the Flow Genome Project. The Flow Genome Project is an organisation dedicated to helping people heal by embracing the ecstatic and doing so in the reverie of community. Such explorations have led to meeting some of the most amazing human beings. Home Grown Humans, who live to hold their hands out to others to help them stand up in their own grief and live into their magical gifts. I have worked with FGP for a number of years now and have completed every program they have put out in the world.
At the start of 2019, I headed to the Redwood forests of California to participate in their Coaching Certification program. It was here that I met my Boat Team (as well as so many other beautiful human beings). A Boat Team is a Navy Seals term for a small group of humans who leave no one behind. My team was made up of legends from Australia, USA, and Japan. Our connection is still alive in the souls of every member of that team. A team we called Kokoro, which is Japanese for “connecting mind, body, and spirit.” I still speak regularly to members of Kokoro. We celebrate each other. Support each other. Cry on each other's shoulders. This is not a team of individuals. This is a unified soul experience where we are forever different for meeting.
Life needs more Kokoro.
Syntropic World
The weave of Kokoro, in particular Benny Wallington, led me to Syntropic World. A movement started by Chief Steward, Christine McDougall, Syntropic World is dedicated to helping build new human endeavours for a world with a future. The Masterclass circles I have had the privilege of being a part of having left me inspired, unified, and equipped with a new way of meeting the world. Artisans, change agents, coaches, conscious business model builders, regenerative artists, the list goes on. An inspired collection of spectacular human beings who are coming together to be greater ancestors. Path builders for new ways to meet this world. I am forever grateful for the wisdom and craftsmanship that has woven its way through me as a result of being held in this community.
Not many people know this about me but I regularly seek powerful female wisdom keepers to apprentice to. I am at my current school because I sought to work and learn from an amazing human being, Deb Sukarna. I have always felt more seen in the eyes of the feminine. The balance of fierceness, empathy, vision, and care has been my blueprint for learning to lead in this lifetime. And I am forever grateful.
Where are you held?
So my question to you is this, do you have spaces, places, and people to speak through the energy that moves in you? Do you have spaces, places, and people to drop your guard with and speak from the core of you?
If not, I encourage you to journey along the path to find them. Personally, I find that I seek spaces that can hold dissonance with the reverence it deserves. I seek places that call for me to speak from the heart. I connect with people who are not afraid to be fallible. Not afraid to show up as they are, not as a projection or veneer. These compass points have led me to the most amazing communities.
And I am forever grateful for being seen, heard, and witnessed.
I'd love to hear about your communities. Drop a comment below or reply to this email.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
The wind is threatening to blow the windows in as I sit. The kids are in bed and I'm really weary. Tired, I'm just not sure what to write. The fingers are hovering over keys but not committing to any future movement. As they hover, over the wind’s howl, a request is sung in my ear.
Dad, can you tuck me in?
The request, from my seven-year-old son Quinn. A boy who up until a year ago wanted nothing but the comfort of his mum's embrace (still a sucker for a Mum cuddle though). In his world, Mum was everything. Dad barely cracked the top ten. Then something shifted and I became his world. Poor Mum, publicly booted on every occasion.
Can Dad take me?
Can Dad read to me?
Is Dad coming?
The flattery is magic. I get it. My Dad is my idol and I still cherish the moments we get to spend together. And I cherish wholeheartedly the little moments from my youth. He is looking to me like I looked to my father. The inquiry that is most alive for me is not about a boy to man relationship. Family structures are so nuanced today and I have seen many different outcomes. The inquiry that is most alive for me is about seizing the moments.
When my kids would ask for my time, I used to find myself saying no by default. No to play opportunities. No to playful invitations. In my head, I would lord out a platitude of excuses. I'm tired. I'm busy. I'm just not interested in that particular activity. Whatever the excuse, it was met with a defeated glint in their eyes. This is not just for playing with my kids. I would also default to no with requests from mates and family. Upon reflection, there are a few items at play here.
Loose boundaries, doing too much, and the too hard basket.
Loose boundaries - I set up poor energetic boundaries. Work bled into home life. Work bled into rest. The squeakiest wheel overtook my priorities. We all need time to ourselves. To recharge. For introspection. For rest. Since reinforcing these boundaries by getting up early to have time for myself, building a better work-to-home transition strategy, and prioritising recovery, I have felt more energetic.
Doing too much - Saying yes to everything is saying no to the most important things. I revisited my values (check out What do you stand for here) and build my day around what means the most in my life. This simple practice is something I keep coming back to.
Too hard basket - This is just laziness on my part. Ensuring that my energy is good and my priorities are right has helped me re-evaluate this.
Seizing the moments
The blessing of Covid has been more family time. I now catch myself when the requests come through. Dad, can you come and play drums with me? Dad, can you come and play superheroes with me? I hear the old story move through me and then I move toward his request. Even if I can only give five minutes, I give that time with all of my being. The same goes for my daughter. As they grow older, the requests will be less and less so I want to make sure that I grab with both hands all of the moments I can. If we take the offer, we are gifted. Gifted with an eternal moment carried in our hearts.
This poem is a tribute to that gift.
A glimpse of eternity
When glimpses glint
in the eyes of the revered
the wind takes hold of the fresh-eyed sails
Half smiles and twisted feet
hold swaying bodies
nervous with anticipation
It doesn't take much
to lend an ear to a soul
that cranes its neck upward
A gentle touch
A nourishing word
plants deeply in the soil of being
taking hold for life
To you, it is but a second of your time
To them, it is an eternity of joy
A springboard
A lantern that lights the view just enough
for them to take a look and like what they see
So thank you
For the reflection in your eyes
of an ask, a want, a hope
You have given eternity
We are always a work in progress. Fallible. Flawed. But it is the ability to recognise these and make shifts that is delightfully human. The biggest gift we can give those who crane their eyes to look at us is our attention and deep presence.
It is an eternal gift.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hey Hedge Schoolers,
I'm writing this newsletter on the heaviest day of the year. July 20 is the 15th anniversary of my brother's death. A day that as a family, we get through. A day that is viscerally charged. In between shares on socials, I find myself swamped in love and community. United in grief and care, I speak to those whose lives were impacted by my brother's presence. Lament has been a passenger for a long time. Those who have lost someone they love will understand the dark passenger that hovers in the shadows.
Today also marks the day that I publicly announced my book beyond this magic community. The path that I feel called to step into is the brokering of dialogue around loss and grief. The book is a raw and personal journey that has taken 15 years to flower. It has kept gnawing at me. And so I want to share a part of the opening chapter. I am not a victim of grief. I am a ferocious lover and lament is a song that honours that love.
Expression through prose and poetry was discovered in the crucible of my own grief. But it has only been recently that I have had the air to move these words from whispers to page. I thank you for taking the time to read, share and reflect.
Excerpt from "a light in the lament"
Mine was a Friday afternoon.
My beige hangover nursed by a belly full of chicken nuggets. My quintessential PE teacher's lunch as fuel, I was setting up the softball diamond for Inter-school sport. As the thud of the third base hit the ground, I felt the haptic buzz on my thigh. Distracted by the arrival of the opposing school's bus, I let it go. Swallowing a gulp of fresh air to help the seediness subside, honouring it with a nuggety belch, I pressed on with my duties.
Again, the incessant buzz...
Reaching into my pocket I noticed a slew of missed calls. The new Samsung phone confusing. Oh, how I yearned for my trusty Nokia 3310.
Looking at the screen, I saw four missed calls in quick succession from Dad.
It rang again…
This time, Aidan flashed up - my younger brother.
As I answered, the sun hit me with all its glory.
I closed my eyes to be swept up by the magical July day.
“Hey mate, what’s up?”
Mourning strangle
Haptic doorways
lead to forever moments
of cataclysmic impact
Where scorched lines in grass
mask underworld abductions.
The reign of blood soaked tears,
time travel anchor points
available in an eye blink,
lead to the mourning strangle
we hope morning will forget,
but know gasping grasps
cannot escape
the stark of this dark.
If I don't answer,
does it change his/story?
To those who have walked with dark passengers, I honour your courage and willingness to be in your lament.
With love,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
The wintery edge greets me every morning as I step outside. The cold cutting to the bone, a sign of nature's deep inner work. Such a deep retreat is a reset. A time to slow down. A time to trim back the branches of life. A time to stoke the inner fire. Personally, I find myself coming back to the little things. The micro-practices that have always provided the oxygen mask when a life of doing threatens to strangle me with overwhelm. These daily tending practices are fractals. Deliberately small in nature, but when amplified over time covers much distance. Daily steps. Daily reverence whilst sitting at the altar of you.
The Altar of You
I've been reflecting on my journey in this space deeply as of late. Two edits into a book manuscript have raised the overwhelm. And it is to my daily practices I have turned. To anchor myself in the truth that a threshold beckons. I must prepare energetically through doing and non-doing. Harmony is the name of the game.
Am I getting enough rest?
Am I allowing myself to be trapped in the grooves of story?
Can I transmute this energy?
My practices are broad. Simple. Sustainable. It is not a list of things to do but a suite of reverent rituals that I use to pray at my own altar.
Movement
This is my anchor practice. When thoughts and emotions cloud my inner landscape, I get into my body. Thoughts and emotions are energy and so I use the crucible of movement to move any stagnant energy. At the end of a run or workout, the energy of these thoughts and emotions has been transmuted. I've lit them up. Kindling for diving deeper into the heart of the matter. What is the essence of the energy behind them? Are they true? Are they serving me? I've always found movement to be the fire I need to burn off the dross of old narratives. Everything is energy, so why not move with it instead of against it.
Meditation
To counterbalance this, I always meditate after exercise. I have better material to work with as I sit in deep reverence. Sometimes I meditate with a mantra. Other times I focus on a glyph or my breath. I allow my meditation practice to emerge as it needs. It is this stillness that allows me to sit in the moments that have been gifted to me.
Nature
I sit in nature every day. My nature needs to meet nature. Under a canopy of a tree, in big nature, in my backyard, it doesn't matter. Nature is the centrepiece of my altar and I am learning to surrender more and more to the magnificent counsel of nature. It grounds me in the magnificence of my life. So much beauty in the detail.
Sunlight
This goes hand in hand with nature visits. We are beings of light. Light provides life. So I make sure that I get my fill every day. It is too easy to sit inside in comfort all day. But it doesn't serve.
Read
There are so many songs sung alive in the books I read. Poetry. Old wisdom. New wisdom. Rich questions. Better questions. I am a voracious reader. Always have been. Always will be.
Five-minute poem
Channeling my inner William Stafford, I have committed to writing daily poems. Writing poetry grounds me in moments. I am the channel for spirit to meet soul. And these are the songs that sung through me when I sit in those moments.
Shadow work
I chart this to ensure that I am living in integrity. It is so easy to speak with two faces. My shadow work is to do with the reverence of the sacred. I have spoken openly about this here and I am so proud of my work in this space. I am welcoming home all of the elements of me.
Music
Playing music. Listening to music. Singing. It doesn't matter. Music is always felt in our bones and I just love the way that music captures me in a trance. Such an ancient dance.
The point of it all
The daily practices are a deliberate way of meeting myself every day. No matter what state that is. Daily practices provide anchor points to check-in. A recognition and acknowledgment that I will ebb and flow. Some days will be up. Some will be down. It doesn't matter, for nothing is permanent. The daily practices become a lighthouse for all conditions. Helping me stand up and show up every day.
What are your daily practices?
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Integrity has been the area of my life that I have done the most work over the past few years. It is easy to project a veneer that looks one way from the outside and another from the inside but integrity is what stares back at us in the mirror when we gaze deep into our eyes. Deep enough to see the life that is breathed alive in us. We may justify or rationalise with story but deep down, we know when we are living with integrity. This is shadow work of the deepest level. Being in integrity is freedom. For the truth is freedom.
What is integrity?
Integrity is our inner truth. A truth that provides the most robust platform to build a life of character and honour upon. Dictionaries define integrity as "the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles" but there is more to integrity than this. Integrity comes from the word "integer", which means wholeness. Being in integrity is to be whole. A whole shape.
Humans are a complete system and part of a larger system. Our shape (or form) allows us to have an inner experience and engage with the larger system we are situated in. Our shape is our wholeness. All of it. Not just the bits that we wish to put on display. This unique shape is only ever known by us. We can influence how the world perceives us but we can never hide from the integrity of our own inner experience.
Nature's Integral Shape
In nature, the tetrahedron is considered the "minimum integral system in the Universe." It is the smallest whole that we can learn from. Buckminster Fuller learned this by studying how nature created integral structures. He discovered that the tetrahedron is nature's preferred Lego block and he used this shape to create powerful physical design models that held their integrity. Christine McDougall is my proxy to the teaching of Buckminster Fuller so I'll stand on her shoulders to share why the tetrahedron is so valuable to integrity
In order for us to see otherness, we need an inside and an outside. We need a system.
A minimum of four corners is required for existence. The tetrahedron is the minimum system in Universe. The tetrahedron is also the simplest way to enclose space using the least amount of matter and energy. The tetrahedron requires six relationships around the four corners.
The point of this…
There is a geometry to relationships and to the endurance of relationships. Three triangulates but does not have dimension and does not create space. Four enables dimension, systems, space. Four holds it’s shape. Four has integrity as a system.
Christine McDougall
Quintessence, Pattern Integrity, and Signature Sound
If we are a whole system ourselves and situated in a whole system, we can use the shape of the tetrahedron to ensure integrity. This is what Christine calls our Pattern Integrity. Nature only deals in originals so everything has a Pattern Integrity. We can use the tetrahedron as a physical representation of our own integrity.
Personal.
Business.
Community.
Relationships.
Any area of our lives that requires integrity...which is all in my opinion.
The tetrahedron has four vertex corners, six straight edges, and four triangular faces. As Christine shares above, the fourth dimension creates the inside and outside experience. If we are the tetrahedron, we begin with the four elements that make us unique. These four elements come together to form the shape that is us. In Alchemy, the four elements (fire, air, water, earth) come together as a whole to form the fifth element (The Quintessence or Ether). Our four elements together in harmony are our unique expression, our Quintessence, our Pattern Integrity. Carl Jung knew this. He studied Alchemy extensively and used the four elements represented by the tetrahedron to shape his thinking.
Practical Application
Part 1:
So sit with this inquiry.
What are the four elements that make you distinctively you?
Put five minutes on a timer and list as many as possible. Once the timer goes off, order the list. You can only have four. Once you have your four, list them on the attached blank template.
If you find this inquiry hard to begin with, try completing the process for your business or job.
What are the four elements that form the wholeness of your business or role?
Part 2:
Once you have your four elements, you now determine the six relationships. Each of the four elements relates to each other in a unique way.
How do the two elements connected by a relationship work together?
What is needed to ensure that integrity of the shape holds?
Below are my two examples (Personal & Work) that I have completed
As you can see from my examples, I refer to Pattern Integrity as our Signature Sound. This is our unique expression. Our Signature Sound can only be sung alive by us. And we must protect with ferocity and honesty the integrity of this shape. Learn from the tetrahedron. Use the constraints of the four elements to speak directly to your Pattern Integrity. You will never ever be in this world again in this form, so you might as well ensure that you hold the integrity of this form while you have breath in you.
It is your truth.
As always, I'm teaching while inquiring so please send me through your questions and practice applications. Also if you feel someone would vibe with this post, please hit the share button below.
Till next week,
Steve
References:
https://syntropic.world/
https://syntropic.world/geometry-relationships-creating-organisational-structural-integrity/
https://syntropic.world/4-conversations-to-enable-your-team-to-produce-exponential-outcomes-in-a-world-where-human-work-is-being-replaced-by-technology/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrahedron
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
According to Socrates, nothing that can be learned needs a teacher. Each week I utilise the Socratic principle of teaching and teach while conducting an inquiry. A proud generalist, these inquiries cover a variety of landscapes, with the steps taken being the laying of the path as I walk. Recently I shared the story of the two-faced Roman God Janus in relation to horizon mapping. Have a reread to catch yourself up as it is a delightfully simple but pragmatic practice to help you with your own learning. This week, I want to ground that practice in a little fact-finding mission. This mission is delightfully simple and filled with clues. Clues to help you chart the path you have just recently walked.
Clews
The etymology of language has become a pivotal practice in my own inquiry. Retracing the steps of language to genesis can tell us so much about the word's original intent. How it came to shape our understanding. Michael Meade first introduced me to the origin of the word 'clues'. Clues, is from the Saxon word "clews", meaning a ball of thread. In his book Genius Myth, Meade shares the Greek myth of Ariadne's thread to outline the importance of paying attention to the clues life gives us.
In short, Ariadne provided thread and a sword to her lover Theseus to help him slay the Minotaur in the middle of the Labyrinth. The thread (clews) helped Theseus find his way back to her. Clues in our own lives help us find our way back to who we truly are. Clews help us get beyond the blank page, beyond the doubt. For we don't ever arrive empty-handed. We always arrive with a collection of trinkets, experiences, and questions. We arrive with the thread in our hands. But with our eyes positioned to only take in the future, to only take in that which is ahead, we often forget our clews. The clews that have led us to where we are right now.
We chose the rabbit holes.
The adventures.
The swashbuckling jaunts.
We followed our intentions.
Our desires.
Our interests.
They are all parts of the puzzle. All part of the thread of who we are.
Sixth passengers, Echo Chambers, and Seven Questions
To break free of my own echo chamber, my wife always chooses the podcasts for our drives. She has a knack for bringing interesting sixth passengers to our family drives. The podcast that spurred my thinking for this week's inquiry was a conversation with Brene Brown and the author of "The Coaching Habit", Michael Bungay Stanier. Stanier is a huge proponent of question-based coaching (you can see why it perked my attention) and in the podcast, he steps Brene through his process of working with clients. One particular question really grabbed my attention. On the first pass, it seems broad and not particularly deep, but I know that most people really struggle answering it.
What do you want?
The blank page of a future not yet written. There are so many options right out in front of us when we ask this question. The sheer vastness is enough to leave many people unsure, stuck, or fearful. An easier version of this question is to use our current clews in life to outline what we don't want. This gets the rusty water of creativity flowing clear. We may not be clear about the path ahead, but we know the paths we don't want to walk. The clews of our last few steps can also shed a light on what is truly alive for us at the moment. These clews can shed a light on what is piquing our curiosity. It is pulling on the thread of these clews that can provide us a way back to ourselves.
What do my recent explorations tell me about where I am in the labyrinth of my own life?
Five-step mapping
The practice is quite simple. Make a list of the last five explorations in a range of inquiry areas.
-
The last five podcasts that grabbed you
-
The last five books that you read completely
-
The last five websites, articles, blog posts, YouTube videos, newsletters that grabbed your attention
After you have collated the list, have a look at the list. What does it tell you? What questions were looking to be solved? What, as my dear mentor Leon Cossar would say, 'stretched your attention in the right direction’? Note down themes. Note down feelings. Note down anything else of interest. Revisit the steps and note any quotes of interest.
There is a reason you walked these paths.
-
Sit with the clews and ask yourself how these steps will shape where you are going next.
-
Once you have allowed the clews to marinade in your consciousness, set aside five minutes to write continuously. You may like to pose a question at the top of your page to target the writing. For example, what message does my last five steps have for me?
My example
Books
-
Recapture the Rapture - Jamie Wheal
-
The Journey of Soul Initiation - Bill Plotkin
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Understanding Human Design - Karen Curry
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The Shark's Toothbrush - Jay Harman
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Gene Keys - Richard Rudd
Podcasts
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The Emerald - Tyson Yunkaporta on Pattern, Kinship, and Story in a World of Decontextualised Minds
-
Alchemergy - Alchemy for Personal Transformation
-
Living Myth - The Breath of Life
-
Living Myth - The Call of the Elder
-
Super Soul - Oprah Winfrey: The Map
Websites/YouTube/Newsletters
-
YouTube - Firing Line with William F. Buckley Jr.: The Idea of The Great Ideas
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YouTube - Alan Watts - Being in the Way - Following the Taoist Way
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Newsletter - Slowww - 10 Insights to Inspire Your Inner Generalist from “Range” by David Epstein (Book Summary)
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Website - Farnam Street - How to Read a Book: The Ultimate Guide by Mortimer Adler
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Article - Gustin - Discovering Purpose: Soulwork & the Purpose Octagon
My five minutes
I see a wrestle in place between polarities. The wrestle between stillness and moving. Being a generalist has always felt like a hindrance but it is in fact a deep asset. My exploration of Human Design and Gene keys provide great maps to help this to thrive. I am deeply interested in the alchemy of transformation and read broadly to gather my insights. This then helps with the creation of maps with which to explore new ground. Nature is a big theme. My own nature and how I connect to the greater web of life. I feel the calling of elderhood and that this broad journey is leading me to come back to the idea that stillness and deep inquiry through deep listening is the path forward. There is no need to rush. The calling of purpose keeps on calling and I have all the clues I need. Breathe as life is only alive if I do. Notice the connectedness to all things. Hold ideas lightly. Naming them tames them and destroys the magic. Be in it, not talking about. Experience. Share. Honour. There are lessons from nature that can be learned in all areas. Be the alchemy.
The above paragraph is unedited. Rereading it, I feel comforted by the journey traveled and stronger in position where I stand. The need to rush forward is met and held in place. There are many clews amongst these steps. They map the future of Hedge School. An honouring of my deep calling to teach while inquiring and to help others to do so. As Mortimer Jerome Adler shares in the Idea of the Great Ideas, “the best teacher is the teacher who in the course of teaching is themselves is learning.”
What can you learn about where you are right now by exploring where you have been?
What insight does it provide to your own quest to figure out what you want?
What next steps does it outline for you?
Personally, my next steps have been to step more and more into mentoring as a direct offering. It is a calling that keeps on calling.
What are your next steps?
I'd love to hear from you so respond to the email and share them.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
A welcome to you from the Surf Coast of the Bellarine Peninsula. My family and I are once again in our happy place, Ocean Grove. Beach air, the novelty of new routines, and plenty of rest are just the remedy for the welcoming of the Winter Solstice. The shortest day of the year marking the first steps towards Spring. Towards new life. For me, that life is the birth of a book, a process I know little about. The fumbling steps of a newborn have begun with the first draft being finished and now edited with precision and care by my dear friend Leslie Lau. It is a joyous gift I will return to Leslie as his first draft sits in my inbox. Together we are learning on the go and sharing the journey publicly.
Reading and writing have gifted me so much over the years and I find the closer I am to the holding of my own book, the more my old mate doubt wants to pull up a seat and have a chat.
This week's inquiry is a stilling of my urge to run from him and the penning of a tribute to a voice that has always had my best interests at heart but sometimes sucks at delivery.
Old mate Doubt
“Until my song comes here to learn its words, my art is but the hope of song” Wendell Berry - The Peace of Wild Things
Old mate doubt. Someone who knows you better than anyone else. A voice. A feeling. An energy. Who knows. Doubt helps shine a light on areas you find hard to see, sharpening your eyesight to ensure that all is well in your world. A loyal soldier, as Bill Plotkin, would call it.
Unfortunately, like many of you, I feel off when they are in the room. Like their presence indicates that I'm not ok. A presence I find myself scrambling to get away from. A reign of chaos when I so desperately crave order.
Lately, I've been working on improving my relationship with doubt. Building the courage to sit in the doubt? To start with the thought (or thoughts) and move through to the emotions that the thought brings about. Can I follow doubt all the way down into the body? Can I find doubt?
With a beginner's mind, I notice. Noticing with the best tool I have, compassionate inquiry. So many questions drop into my conscious field.
How does something that does not exist have so much sway and power?
What purpose does my doubt serve?
What lessons does my doubt have for me?
I won't dare speak to your doubt but I know you will notice similarities. Charted patterns that feel familiar.
Origin stories
Doubt. Confusion. Fear. Worthiness. They have biological underpinnings. Keep life alive. Dark corners, new spaces, public expression, leave us open for a multitude of deaths. So the closer you get, the louder the volume. Step back from the edge. Are you sure this is safe? Do you trust this person? This feels off, should we hide?
What an ally! A friend that looks out for me and only me. A friend that has managed to keep me safe for 43 years on this beautiful planet. My memories of doubt's origin stories are faint. But as a father, I get to see my own origin reflected in the growth of my own kids.
My six-year-old son Quinn is beginning to meet doubt. It just happens to be in different areas.
"Dad, I am really excellent at Monkey bars."
Full truth. Full belief. Doubt nowhere to be seen.
But I see the doubt in his outstretched hand as we enter a new space with strange faces. Doubt is there to take care of him in this situation. Doubt and Dad to the rescue go hand in hand. He doubts strangers, which is awesome but does not doubt himself. What a marvelous combination. Doubt the dangerous but never your ability. This is a master lesson. This observation leads me to wonder when does doubt turns against us? Is it to protect our social status? Is it to prevent embarrassment? Where do the wheels come off?
I know school plays a part. I see it in the 18-year-old students that leave school. The wide-eyed Monkey bar legends are replaced with young adults who have let many possible pathways in life become overgrown and unavailable. I'm always deeply saddened by this. Speaking to my daughter's Prep teacher, I told her that my only goal for her at school was to leave school with the same spirit and zest for life. I actually chose more choice words than that. I don't want school to f**k her up as she is perfect as she is. And as a parent, I will fight tooth and nail to ensure that this happens.
Comparing Apples to Oranges
Mimicry plays a key part in our doubt. As our consciousness sharpens, we notice how we are different. Social media amplifies this. As we struggle through the awks of puberty, we want only to fit in. To be liked. So we wear the same clothes, display the same patterns of behaviour, and in general, sacrifice our uniqueness in a bid to blend into the fabric of friends and welcome community.
This makes doubt happy. Strength in numbers. One of the crowd.
But we are not the crowd. The call to give the gifts we were born to give keeps on calling. A calling that doubt looks to quell. A quelling using any method possible. Self-loathing. Harsh critique. Imposter Syndrome. Straight-up insults.
It is at this point that doubt goes too far. The thought attacks drive us to a standstill. We stop taking action on the things that light us up the most. I can attest to this. I have about four versions of this book written but have bailed at persevering due to doubt.
So how do we make friends with doubt?
Welcoming home the Loyal Soldier
In Wild Mind: A Field Guide to the Human Psyche, Depth Psychologist Bill Plotkin outlines a strategy to welcome home our Loyal Soldier, Doubt. To give you context, I'll share this excerpt from Wild Mind.
The image of the Loyal Soldier derives from a World War II epilogue. Hundreds of Japanese soldiers who survived shipwrecks or plane crashes in the Pacific found themselves stranded, alone or in small groups, on uninhabited or sparsely settled islands. Several of these soldiers were discovered many years after the war had ended—one of them thirty-five years later! The most astonishing thing is that, when found, these men exhibited an extraordinary, perhaps fanatical, loyalty to their military mission. Unaware the war had ended, each one, upon being found, was ready to immediately return to the war effort. They were told, of course, the war was over and that Japan had lost. But this was literally unthinkable to them: the war could not be over because their loyalty to the cause was what had kept them alive all those years.
The rescued soldiers were welcomed home in Japan with great honor and celebration. The Japanese people deeply respected the soldiers’ capacity to sacrifice their personal agenda for a greater cause. Their sustained welcome as heroes eventually enabled the soldiers to reinvent themselves and to productively rejoin society.Source: Wild Mind
Doubt is our loyal soldier. It fights valiantly for us. Always has. Always will. But we are not always under attack. We need to bring home this loyal servant. To do so requires pause and poise. It requires compassionate inquiry.
Am I truly under attack?
Is what I'm hearing truthful?
Can I notice the doubt and welcome home the loyal servant with open arms?
If we can pause in those moments of doubt, we can make peace with our old mate. Doubt will always be in the room. Just the mere presence is a sign that we're on the right track. Our work in progress is ensuring that doubt doesn't mute the sounds of our song.
For not singing the songs we were born to sing would be a greater atrocity than a little uncomfortableness.
So doubt, I thank you humbly for your service. For your continued service. But I'm ok. I'm safe. And I have a song to sing.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Have you ever found yourself between worlds? In times of transition, we step into liminality. A time where the world of old is making way for a new world. During this time, we find ourselves awash with confusion and doubt. The pull of the old way, comfortable and known, wrestles with the light and growth of the new way. A mist covers the path ahead.
How do we navigate a path if we can't see the next step?
In Roman times, the god of Janus, a two-faced god who looked back and forward, held the keys here. Janus, the god of doors, gates and, transitions, can provide great insight during an evolutionary phase in our lives. Whether it is in work, family life, or personal growth, standing still and looking both backward and forward allows us to take stock of the best of the past and the brightness of the future. In Futures Thinking, the Janus effect is a key component of Three Horizons Thinking.
Three Horizons Thinking
The ‘Three Horizons’ framework is a foresight tool that can help us to structure our thinking about the future in ways that spark innovation. - Daniel Christian Wahl
The first horizon is the world we are transitioning from. Our business as usual. Practices, methodologies, habits, ways of being, that have served us well until now.
What are the key components of your current Horizon 1?
What are the practices that have served you well until now?
A personal example of mine was drinking alcohol. In the land of Oz, I was considered a socially acceptable drinker. Whatever that means. Drinking was part of the social fabric of my life.
It served the purpose of state shifting. It greased the wheel of social interaction for a shy kid. It helped to quieten a busy mind.
Until it didn't.
Until I felt greater anxiety with one drink in me. Until I felt I needed more to reach the state shift. Until I felt socially self-conscious with a drink in me. Until it muddied my mind. Until I felt the physical effects of excess.
This sparked the desire for a new world. A new way of being. A new horizon. Our pain and trauma are often sources of great innovation. The moments where we put our foot down and decide to make a change. To seek a new horizon.
This horizon is known as Horizon 3. The dream of a new future.
What is the world that you are moving towards?
What are the practices you seek to shift?
My Horizon 3 was a world free from booze. It was a dream of more energy, clarity, presence, and new experiences. It was a world of improved health and wellbeing.
When the world of old starts to fail us, we dream of the new world. The new horizon. But the process of moving towards that horizon is a tumultuous time. It is a time of disruption. In the Three Horizons framework, this is the building of a bridge. A time of rapid discovery and experimentation. A time of rapid learning and growth.
Horizon 2 is the building of the bridge between worlds, with the Janus effect allowing you to assess the planks you lay as you walk to ensure they are building the bridge in the right direction.
The Janus Effect and Horizon 2
Growth is measured in retrospect. By looking back, we can gauge how far we have traveled. Gauge how much we have grown. With the Three Horizons framework, looking back allows us to see what elements of the old we wish to keep. There is no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. These elements used to serve us so we need to gauge whether we build upon them or discard them. The elements we decide to keep will be brought with us.
For me, catching up with my friends had revolved around meeting at a bar. I didn’t want to get rid of this. I wanted to see bands with my mates and be present at social occasions. This was non-negotiable.
The elements that are not serving us serve as experiments to run. States to disrupt. How we get from Horizon 1 to Horizon 3. This is the bastion of Horizon 2. It is a period of experimentation with the Janus effect helping to classify whether our experiment is simply supporting Horizon 1 or disrupting Horizon 1.
Our experiments in Horizon 2 can be classified into two categories.
(H2-) Experiments that serve to reinforce the Horizon 1 world
(H2+) Experiments that serve to reinforce the Horizon 3 world and disrupt Horizon 1
To bring this down from a conceptual model, let me apply it to my previous example of change. The years between making the decision to quit and quitting alcohol were rife with experimentation. I tried variations of abstinence, drink choice, and activities. Below are some classification examples:
(H2-)
Only drinking on the weekends.
Every second drink a non-alcoholic beverage
(H2+)
Febfast, Dry July & Octsober
Counting the number of days in a year I drank
The H2- experiments didn't change the behaviour, they only delayed it. I found that I made up for the lost time when I did. The H2+ experiments gave me a real glimpse of the clarity that life without booze would provide. The accountability of counting provided a gradual decrease over time.
Horizon 3 is now where I call home and it has been a blessing.
Applying the Janus effect
Janus is a two-headed god that can provide the duality of looking forward and backward to ensure that our path to transformation is being laid in the right direction. Horizon 1 is the old world. Horizon 3 the new. Horizon 2 is where all the growing and learning happens. This is where we try to disrupt our old patterns. Classifying our experiments using the Janus effect allows us to see if we are simply reinforcing the old ways or are we truly blazing a path forward to a new way of being. The Three Horizons Thinking framework allows us to set a path for transformation and helps provide guardrails for moving towards the new change. The below video provides a great introduction to the model when applied to a system or organisation.
Till next week,
Steve
References and rabbitholes
https://www.andersonlock.com/blog/god-doors/
https://medium.com/activate-the-future/the-three-horizons-of-innovation-and-culture-change-d9681b0e0b0f
https://designforsustainability.medium.com/evaluating-disruptive-innovation-in-the-age-of-transition-33b647a6bfec
https://resources.h3uni.org/tutorial/three-horizons/
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
A dear welcome to you wherever you are in the world. In the time of tumult we find ourselves in, I feel called to catch my thirsty mind and its desire to know and conquer.
Certainty. The eternal trickster. The calling card of fear. I see you everywhere. Social soapboxes where we scream the truth to all who will hear. And scream louder to those who won't. I find little solace in the eternal seeking. The perpetual treadmill of needing to trap, label and categorise has driven me mad in the past. The more sure I believe myself to be, the more doubtful I am. Certainty has been a cause of suffering.
"You suffer from uncertainty - and uncertainty is the nature of life. Certainty is
part of death. Be certain and you will be dead. Remain flowing, remain
uncertain, remain available to the changing circumstances, and you will remain
more and more alive."
Osho - What is Real Rebellion
The Conversation killer
One only needs to turn on the news or their favourite social media platform to gauge the divide in many areas of our lives. Take any issue and you will find sides picked, ideologies set, and backs against the wall. Comments, hashtags, subreddits, provide congregation fuel for gas lighting and insults. Dialogue is snuffed out early as troops with supporting beliefs rally to have your back. I find this really demoralising. So much noise. So hard to gain a clear signal. I want to see and hear but I find I'm lost in the mist of rhetoric and certainty.
So how do we fan the flames of discourse without burning each other?
Stubborn Contemplation of Opposing Truths
I am a big fan of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. As a poet, a thinker, and as a human being. Goethe's wisdom can help provide a light here. He developed a thinking strategy that allowed “holding two opposing truths in two hands and walking forward” in stubborn contemplation. Two key elements to his method were:
A Beginner's mind
Being highly selective of the material that informs your judgment
I first came across, Shoshin, or beginners mind, from Shenryu Suzuki's brilliant book "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind." According to Wikipedia, a beginner's mind is defined as "having an attitude of openness, eagerness, and lack of preconceptions when studying a subject, even when studying at an advanced level, just as a beginner would." I know that I don't know. Embracing the naivety of our first steps in a new area allows us to take in without shutting down possibilities. I know that I don't know is the widening of our gaze to take it all in without judgment. For Goethe, this allowed for contradictions to show up. These contradictions would then serve as salient guardrails without the emotive charge of choosing a position. It is not for or against but "that's interesting". In this approach, we create a subject/object shift. A technique that Harvard Professor Robert Kegan believes is necessary for the development of complex thinking. For complex situations demand complex thinking. We are not navigating past right or wrong. We are navigating past two truths. Right and right. We are seeking to move past Flatland thinking to elevated thinking. We are not solving problems, we are managing polarities. And so it is extremely important that we are selective of the material that informs our stubborn contemplation. There is always material to support a position. Strength, however, lies in our ability to hold both truths. A great example of this is the website, Allsides. Dedicated to reporting both sides of the fence as well as neutral territory, it is a great example of the third way appearing in the contradictions.
The third way
Emotions can often run high when our position is challenged. Having our truth, our worldview, called out can blind us with emotive responses. Polarised thinking is just that. Polarised. Skewed to suit our way of seeing the world. But as this fantastic article outlines, polarity management allows us to escape Flatland thinking and see the world from a new vantage point. Developed by Barry Johnson, Polarity management is a framework for helping us hold and honour the opposing truths of polarity. We get to see the best of both positions, while also flagging the blind spots which we have turned away from. I've created an introductory video on Polarity mapping which will give you a quick overview of the technique. This is the mental model I use the most as it can be applied to any situation. If you are keen to learn about more of the mental models I use, you can check out this online course I created a little while back. Lots of goodies in there to broaden our scope of the world.
Polarity mapping allows for a third way to emerge. It is the forward step of stubborn contemplation. We take the best of both positions and together as a united force, we co-create a third way forward. We create guardrails for positive progress and list warning signs for backward slipping. We come together, stronger and more tolerant.
“Unity is plural at minimum of two.” - Buckminster Fuller
Till next week,
Steve
References
The Critical Path - Buckminster Fuller
Polarity Management: Identifying and Managing Unsolvable Problems - Barry Johnson
Escape From Flatland Using Polarity Management to Coach Organizational Leaders From a Higher Perspective - Beach Joyce
The Roots of a Science of Consciousness in Hermetic Alchemy - Dennis William Hauck, Ph.D
Allsides - Unbiased balanced news
Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind - Shenryu Suzuki
In Over Our Heads - Robert Kegan
What is Real Rebellion - Osho
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Hey Hedge Schoolers,
The fingers hit the keyboard this week during a fourth lockdown in Victoria. Life, once again, is restricted to five-kilometre radiuses, masks, remote learning, and the daily trickle of information related to numbers, bureaucracy, and political posturing. There is a deep remembrance and trepidation as the likelihood of an extended time anchored at home is looking very likely. It is this I wish to explore for this week's inquiry.
How do we navigate the tumultuous seas of inner and outer drama?
Victimhood and the Drama Triangle
Memes on social media have moved from "You've got this Victoria" to "You have no idea what I'm going through." Drama is to be expected right now. The language of the victim plays loudly in our ear.
Why me?
Why Victoria?
Why?
This can be a slippery slope from which to view the world, so I'll follow Bucky's lead and use a model to argue with. One model that works beautifully in this situation is the Drama Triangle. Developed in 1960 by Dr. Stephen Karpman, the Dreaded Drama Triangle is a social model of human interaction. As you can see from the image below, there are three interactions.
The triangle begins with the Victim. A position that many of us find ourselves in now. This is the poor me. Life is happening to me. Conspiring against me. The Victim feels persecuted. Their agency is non-existent and as such, they feel powerless to make positive choices.
The Persecutor can be a person and/or certain conditions or situations. In this case, Covid plays this role. It might be the restrictions that are persecuting or the conditions of not being able to work. These elements are targeting the victim.
The third and final component of the Drama triangle is the Rescuer. This can be a person or vice. Alcohol, food, social media are a few of the common vices used. The rescuer steps in to save the day but only further reaffirms the helplessness and lack of agency. I am feeling punished by this situation and so I reach for this or find comfort in the solace of this person to heal my wound.
The Drama Triangle is powerful for reading the situation you are managing or find yourself in. What language is being used? Is it negative and helpless? Is drama present? The Drama Triangle allows you to objectively see the current lay of the land. The roles are also not fixed and people can shift in different situations. For example, the victim might rise up negatively and become the persecutor. The key thing to be aware of is that this style of interaction is disempowering for all involved.
Law of Rhythms
Before I shift to a path forward, I wanted to bring in an Immutable (doesn't change) Law of the Universe. The law that makes the most sense is the Law of Rhythm. The world works in accordance with a natural rhythm or cycles. The seasons are a perfect example of this. The pendulum swings from the cold of winter to the heat of summer and back again. Tides move from low to high and back again. Nothing stands still. What is powerful about understanding this is that it means that our lows are not permanent. This also means that our highs are not permanent. Life is impermanent.
"This too shall pass" - Persian adage
Being able to weather our storms and appreciate the transient nature of our highs enables us to embrace the impermanence of life. Nothing lasts forever. The Law of Rhythm moves as it needs to move. So cherish the highs. Cherish the lows. Embracing them both gives you the power to ride the rhythm. And that power is what fuels the Empowerment Dynamic.
The Empowerment Dynamic
Developed by David Emerald as a positive alternative to the Drama Triangle, The Empowerment Dynamic is a model of personal and social empowerment. It is designed to increase agency and positive social interaction. Each role shifts. In mindset and action.
The Victim shifts from reacting to choosing. Agency is activated when we do so. In every situation, no matter how dire, we have a choice. Having a say in the response enables the Victim to shift to the Creator. They take control of their own destiny. The mindset shifts from fixed to growth and baby steps allow them to see that they get to self author their own story.
The Persecutor shifts from putting down to building up. They become the Challenger. They move from tearing down the Victim to creating a rich environment for them to rise up. Trust is high in this relationship. In the case of Covid, we start to see the silver lining of life in lockdown. The focus on the simpler elements of life. The collegiality of a community coming together. The sacredness and fragility of life. This can then build up our capacity for resilience. For making the most of the life we have.
The Rescuer shifts from telling to asking. They become the Coach, encouraging the Creator through constructive and empowering inquiry. They use the power of dialogue to allow the Creator to stand on their own feet. To coach instead of rescuing enables the soil of sovereignty to be nourished. Doing the work for others does not serve them. Helping them stand up on their own two feet by cheering on in dialogue helps others to thrive. Vices that typically have been our solace, our reward for trudging through the world, are seen in a new light. Our relationship with them is different. There is less dependency. Our awareness is heightened as we see we have a conscious choice in each situation.
The Empowerment Dynamic is a powerful model to situate ourselves in. A light in times of dark weather patterns. For this too shall pass, and we will swing back the other way. This is the rhythm of life. A joyous rhythm that is all perfect. The highs and the lows. Bypassing one or the other robs us of the unity of life. For as Bucky would say, unity is plural, at minimum two. High needs low. And vice versa.
Unity needs both to exist.
Alive is a life lived in the radiance of a moment
This week, I have stood still in the weather patterns in my head and around me. I've noticed the brooding that shows up. The sunshine that breaks through the clouds. They are all perfect. For I am grateful that I am alive.
“The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.” — Alan Watts
Remember you have a choice in every situation. Whether that is just the ability to stop and take a breath.
Or to wave hello at a stranger.
Be kind to yourself.
Aliveness is everything.
So choose aliveness.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Welcome, welcome to another week and another inquiry. This week continues my assimilation of Buckminster Fuller's work into my own mental models. Guided by the brilliant tutelage of Christine McDougall, I am having my mind blown weekly. Last week we talked about the Principle of Perturbation and how pressure leads to greater vibration of components, eventually culminating in a threshold crossing where you are left permanently different. Perturbation is an example of what Bucky Fuller calls, generalised principles, always true without exception! These principles then serve as beautiful guideposts for living in accordance with nature. This week I'd like to introduce you to the Principle of Precession.
The Principle of Precession
For every action of a body in motion, there is an effect at 90 degrees.
Bucky unpacks this with an example of a honey bee. The action of the honey bee is to make honey. The effect of this action at 90 degrees is that the bee also then cross-pollinates plants. The purpose is honey making and the side effect is plant pollination. Another popular example is a stone dropped into still water. The stone (body in motion) breaks the water (action) and there is a side effect of ripples across the water's surface.
Within such a simple principle, there are three key parts to unpack.
Bodies in motion
Juicy actions
Side effects to live by
Bodies in motion
“The greatest mistake human beings make is to make themselves wrong for making mistakes. It is our natural way of learning...” Buckminster Fuller
Learning is in action. We, through our actions, are in motion. Guided by feedback, positive or negative. The feedback (aka gift) helps us course-correct and keep in motion. For so many of us, taking the first step is the hardest move. Our stillness traps us in the quicksand of overthinking and we play it safe. We believe it better to save ourselves from potential failure by not starting than to fail for real. Although failure is nothing but a mind story we project.
To bring the gifts we were born to give the world (hat tip Leslie Lau), we must be in motion. We must take action. In the Way of Zen, Alan Watts shares a story about the Chinese practice of yìzhí zǒu, or ‘going straight ahead.’
"A master who was once asked, What is the Tao—the Way? replied, Walk on. Actually, Go! As we say, Go, man! Go! Go, go. And it is this aspect of Zen that is what is truly understood by ‘detachment,’ or having a mind that isn’t ‘sticky’ and that isn’t stopped at any point in its whole working. To be stopped at a certain point is what is called ‘having a doubt,’ as when one fumbles, or wobbles, or hesitates about something—trying to find the right solution for the circumstances by thinking it out in a situation where there really is no time to think it out." Alan Watts - The Way of Zen
In action lies learning. So go, just go. Leave the thinking behind.
Juicy Actions
The humble bee is lit up by making honey. It is this purpose that drives the bee to move from plant to plant. Driving the bee to be in motion. To further elaborate, I am going to piggyback on a beautiful frame Christine shared in our Masterclass last week.
What is the honey that lights you up?
Meaning and purpose are our primary drivers. Money will be on the list for sure. But I would hazard a guess that money is a secondary benefit. It is not the thing that gets us up out of bed in the morning. It helps for sure but for most of us, we need more than the chase of money to drive us. Discovering our honey is a big part of living in accordance with our nature. It was a philosophy that drove Buckminster Fuller. Throughout his own life, he found that living to create a brighter future for all of mankind lit him up. Being lit by this then led to beautiful side effects, which allowed the world to benefit tremendously from the unique genius that was Buckminster Fuller. This genius is in all of us. Money is not the honey light. Find action which you would do just because. Just because it makes the world a better place. Just because nature is improved by you living into your own nature.
Just because!
Side effects to live by
Well, that's all fine and dandy but I need to make a living?
Yes, you do. But financial stability is a side effect. Bucky committed wholeheartedly to juicy actions that made the world a better place for all and he trusted that the Universe would look after that side of the arrangement. And he was right.
“Since nature was clearly intent on making humans successful in support of the integrity of eternally regenerative Universe, it seemed clear that if I undertook ever more humanly favorable physical-environment-producing artifact developments that in fact did improve the chances of all humanity’s successful development, it was quite possible that nature would support my efforts…”Buckminster Fuller
The world needs more people who are alive. Not alive in fat wallets and the over-consumption of finite resources but alive in spirit.
Alive in the generation of a world with a future.
Alive in the nurturing of nature through relationship and conscious connection.
The rest will take care of itself. The plants will be pollinated as a result of actions that light you up. Trust in your transmission, for those that do are magnetic in attraction. And the Universe takes care of its own. Making a living is a by-product of inspired action.
So start making honey dear ones.
Personal Examples of Precession
To bring it all together, I’ll share some examples of the Principle of Precession from my own life.
Quitting drinking - This was a three-year journey (body in motion), which was then cemented by a juicy action (the decision to quit), and the side effect at 90 degrees was that I have a much closer relationship with my son as I have more energy to be present and play with him. Interestingly, another unforeseen side effect was the challenge of redefining how I caught up with my mates. A drink was the act that usually prompted our catch-up. This has been slightly awkward for all parties.
Blogtober - I wrote 750 words every day last year which prompted my dear friend Kristina to invite me to write a blog every day for October (Blogtober). This was the juicy action. The side effect was that I found daily publishing draining but enjoyed the time constraint as a pressure to create content. This led to settling on a weekly cadence and began the Hedge School newsletter.
Coaching - Three years ago I sought out the guidance of Tom Barrett as a coach. The initial consultation was for assistance with writing a book but through dialogue (body in motion), Tom flagged my constant reference to assisting people with transformative growth. He challenged me to reach out to people in my phonebook (action) which led to the side effect of creating a coaching proposal for an EdTech company. I coached members of that organisation for over two years.
As you can see, the inspired action leads to side effects at 90 degrees that are often not on our radar. These can be both positive and negative. Either way, they are feedback. Inspired action with a side effect at 90 degrees. So become a body in motion. Take inspired action and notice what ripples out at 90 degrees.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
How would you respond in a situation where you had only one shot at your dream? One opportunity to go for it. Would you get in your own way? Would fear consume you? Would you give everything you had?
I've contemplated these questions often. Played the scenarios over and over again in my head. But as scenarios go, nothing beats direct experience. We don't know how we'll be until we are in the throes of it. Till our toes meet the 'tairseach.'
Tairseach
Tairsearch (pronounced teer - shock) is the Gaelic word for 'threshold'. A threshold is a dividing line between worlds. A dividing line between irreversible transformation. Throughout our lives, we cross many thresholds. Biological. Spiritual. Developmental. Cultural. The old gives way to the new. Death, the price of admission.
I have had my toes caress the threshold line many times, only to baulk at the next step with my head overcooking the recipe. Overthinking. Fear. Doubt. They have all shown up from time to time. And so I bail from the crossing.
On other occasions, there is pressure that builds and builds and I'm then blasted over the line. With that push, there is deep surrender and deep union and flow with the experience. Upon reflection and with a healthy dose of self-compassion, I often wonder what the difference is.
Why is it easier on some occasions to step towards transformation?
And harder on others?
Is there a critical mass or energetic price of admission required?
This is where Buckminster Fuller comes in.
Perturbation
I've been a fan of Buckminster Fuller's work for a long time. As a thinker. As a change agent. As a human being. He lived to help others thrive. To create a brighter future for those that will come after him. And the seeds of his magic continue to thrive in the fertile soil of inspiring humans. One of those amazing humans is Christine McDougall. Christine has been a student of Bucky Fuller's work for over 30 years and is currently the Chief Steward and Founder of Syntropic World, a global community of practice dedicated to supporting Syntropic Enterprises to become business-as-usual. I'll dig more into the amazing work Christine does over the next few weeks. I am currently in my second masterclass under Christine's tutelage and my mind is blown every week.
Each lesson applies pressure to the models that I have pieced together to make sense of the world. I can feel the dissonance of knowing and not knowing in the same breath. As the pressure rises, the concepts vibrate in my head. I go to sleep with them on my mind, bones for my subconscious to chew on. The more I think, the more vibration, or as Bucky Fuller calls it, the more perturbation that occurs.
And then bam, just out of nowhere, I get it. I cross an imaginary threshold. Forever different, bathing in the high of an 'aha' moment.
Christine calls Perturbation ‘the crucible.’ The crucible provides constraint. Pressure to push against. The more pressure applied, the greater the rate of vibration (perturbation).
To illustrate this, I'd like to share a short perturbation from my upcoming book "A-light in the lament"
I can remember when I finally let out the screams that had kept me awake at night. Once again, I was speaking Kev's story. It was the final presentation of an eight-week public speaking masterclass. Held in a beautiful container by Clare Dea, I journeyed through the world of improvisation, deep presencing, and authentic expression. The masterclass culminated in an individual performance in front of family and friends. My story was about the wrestle I have with the many masks I wear in life. A wrestle amplified by grief and constant shapeshifting
Speaking about the pain in front of strangers is difficult but doing so in front of your parents and siblings trumps that. The presentation was edgy for me and required deep authenticity and complete surrender to the moment. I had practiced it many times and every time I got to the threshold’s edge, I’d surrender. So deeply afraid of what was beyond the line I had marked in the sand, I continually pulled out during practice. The edginess of finally letting go scared me to death.
But speaking the pain alive while I looked into the eyes of my Mum and Dad tipped me over the edge. The pain of the last few years erupted in a scream that shook the room to its core. The spontaneous eruption was the moment of deep surrender where I met the pain and released that to the world. When I let that scream go, I dropped into a moment of deep union with the universe. All the masks were dropped. There was no ‘I’ giving a performance. We were one. It was a oneness I had rarely felt since that call.
The scream was unscripted. And I have never uttered a sound like that since. The sight of my parents weeping as I shared publicly our grief rose the perturbation to the level required to cross the threshold. I crossed that threshold with the expelling of energy. A spontaneous eruption.
To loop it back to my initial inquiry, why is it harder on some occasions to cross the threshold? Simple, the pressure wasn't there. The crucible had leaks. Loose boundaries that I used to escape for fear of actually transforming. Other times, I just wasn't ready. Premature growth without the wings needed for flying. To develop the strength needed to hold open its magical wings, the butterfly must struggle to break the chrysalis. Without the struggle, there is no flying. The same applies to us.
Crossing the ‘tairseach’ due to perturbation is not always a good thing. Death by a thousand cuts can lead to negative eruptions. Lost tempers. Violent eruptions. Mental snaps. Pressure is neutral. How we hold our stead or dissipate our energy are two areas we must continue to work on. With the right crucible, we will be forever different.
A spontaneous eruption of the never before. This is my poetic salute to perturbation and tairseach crossing.
Spontaneous Eruption
Oh what magic births from souls holding court with love
Where depths of whispers are weaved into song
spoken alive with listening
Like water traversing the contours of land
we spontaneously erupt the never before
The magic of maybe dancing with the edges
Knocking on new world doorways
as adjacent possibilities are dreamt into existence
I die in those moments of presence
Katana cut narratives
fall away in reverent pieces
as the sacred beingness
is witnessed
Singing hearts tractor beam connection
There is no separation
Only love
Divine love,
that swallows you in the deepest embrace
Gifted,
I sit back with a smile on my face
Oh the places we will go
with love in our hearts
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
This week I wanted to delve into the world of overwhelm. When great intentions become so large that they strangle us with anxiety. The inquiry is a constant fringe conversation I have with myself. As a perennial yes man, my eyes are bigger than my belly. Insatiable curiosity and wide interests lead to deep rabbit holes that breathe me alive and dead in the same breath. What do I mean by that? The scale of the dream or vision I have energises me and then overwhelms me. So much so, that I hardly move. This experience would be familiar to everyone at least at some point in their life. For me, the overwhelm comes from desperately wanting to put the finishing touches on my book but life is snagging me on the brambles of responsibility and must-dos.
So how do we move through the quicksand of overwhelm?
The Tending Pace
Nature is a master teacher. Efficient, effective, and emergent. So I began my inquiry sitting in nature. Actually with my fingers deep in the soil of the rose bushes near our front window. As the plants prepare for the space of winter, I find myself tending to the overgrowth. Pruning. Shaping. Nourishing the soil. Removing the excess. The process requires slowness and consistency. A thriving garden is not achieved in one sit. In one tremendous, all-out exertion. Nature requires a more intimate relationship, with regularity a key feature. This tending pace is bouts of micro-nourishment over a consistent period. Without it, my garden will fall into disarray. The balance of the environment is thrown off as members of the ecology throw their weight around, strangling the life of others within. For my garden to thrive, I need to tend regularly.
Moonshots and mini steps
For anyone with a grand vision or dream, the peak of the mountain can feel out of reach. The list of things we need to do, don't know how to do or items we don't know we need grow widely in the ecology of our mind. Such weight freezes us in stillness, unable to take the next step. So we don't move on it. It remains at distance. And don't we let ourselves know about it. The inner narratives. The imposter syndrome. The cruel inner critic. They crank to maximum volume. With often our only move, a retreat in the other direction or complete abandonment.
The next steps need not be one giant leap for mankind. The tending pace is micro in nature. And it nurtures our nature. Nurtures our evolution with proof. Proof that we are enough. Proof that we are exactly the person who can do this. Identity-based habits, as James Clear calls them, are shaped with proof. Micro wins that show we are tending to the evolution of the dream. And micro wins are deliciously and deliberately small. One push-up. One sentence. One weed pulled from the garden. These mini-steps are the way we tend to our souls. With slowness, consistency, and gentleness.
Micro nourishment for macro thriving
So this week, I've given up the idea of monumental writing sessions. Gone are the sporadic 4am wake-ups, replaced with a commitment to tend daily to the final writing of my book with ten minutes every day. That time commitment is so small that I don't shudder at the thought. I laugh at it. So small. Such a Tiny Habit, as behavioural specialist BJ Fogg, calls it. I commit only to ten minutes every day. Anything beyond that is a bonus but not necessary. And so every day this week, I have tended to my book and written for more than ten minutes every day. For the friction of the first step is the only battle. The only item I need to work on.
As the saying goes, "the heaviest weight at the gym is the front door." The garden that is my book needs the tending pace. Regular interaction. Regular dialogue. Regular sitting. This micro-nourishment has led to macro thriving. I can feel the momentum building. With every sit, I feel the evolution of the story I tell myself. The micro sits are sessions of macro compassion as I give myself the space to enjoy the journey. To slowly let the final stages unfurl, breathing in every word, and edit.
Your turn
So what dream has been knocking the wind out of your sails recently, slaying you with overwhelm.
How can you apply the tending pace?
What tiny micro nourishment can you commit to every day to ensure that your macro vision thrives?
Be kind. Think small. So, so small. For an inch forward every day is a monumental distance in a month's time. Consistency is delightfully simple. Almost to the point of boredom. But that doesn't discount the magic of showing up every day. In the Yoga Sutures, Patanjali Maharishi outlines a spiritual practice called Abhyāsa. Abhyāsa is a spiritual practice that is regularly and constantly practised over a long period of time. This regular tending is required to tend to the garden of the mind.
We need to show up to our yoga mats.
The only goal is that we show up. The rest takes care of itself.
So inch forward with the tending pace. Nourish your magic with the micro and watch the macro take care of itself. Love the journey beautiful humans and it will love you back.
Till next week,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Tis’ nice to meet your gaze again. My weekend has been a deep journey. Medicine journeys always are, revealing the snags and blind spots that cover my landscape. The work is always work in progress.
Healing.
Remembering.
Honouring.
Calling in prayers.
For me, the word 'tend' anchored me during the transformation.
How do we tend to the relationships, places and gifts we hold so dear?
Do we nourish our bodies, souls, friends, homes, etc...with the love they so much deserve?
Tending to our places helps nourish our lives through deep gratitude. I am so grateful. Grateful for all that is good in my life. Grateful for all the pain that I have endured in my life. Grateful for the scars on bones that grief has brought.
For it has shown me how deeply I love.
Tending to grief
Love is dire. For there is always the threat of death imminent on the landscape. When that death grips us, we are swallowed in the quicksand of dark feelings. So much hurt. So much. To release hurt that cuts so deeply to the bone, leaves scars as markings of resistance. So I've been tending to these scars in the only way I know how. I've been speaking alive the memory of my journey through the writing of my first book. A book that has always been my first book.
A book of lament.
A book where words that wail, weep their way across the page as I embody the remembering. A visceral memory that Dr. Martin Shaw calls 'bone memory'.
The book title landed over the weekend as I further tended to and digested the grief that had anchored me in pain. The grief that pushed me over the 'tairseach'. Over the threshold.
So "A-light in the lament: Poetic flowers amidst the scars" will be coming soon.
The tending to these scars also brought alive a desire to help others speak alive their grief. Brought alive the desire to hold space for the remembering and honouring of a life that has meant so much.
Death as social leprosy
When we first meet the deluge of pain that is death, we find our breath too shallow to speak. Words are hollow in the face of grief. Tears are the only language that speaks through us. During this initial phase, all around us ask how we are doing. We are showered in offers of help and support but are too fragile to even contemplate any forward steps.
But as the seasons of time move over our landscape, we begin to feel the urge. The urge to hold on through story. The urge to speak through the darkness in search of light.
But too often, we find the help and support have faded. This is not a judgment but a reality.
Life continues moving.
Speaking about death can often feel like a form of social leprosy. When I was finally able to utter the words that my younger brother had died in a car accident without crying, I wanted desperately to speak his memory alive. But the ears I yearned for were not always ready to hold that space.
And that is ok.
To those who have lost someone, you will know the yearn. As you feel the grip of your memories slip over the years, you desperately want to speak. To speak alive the pain that helps with the healing. Oral recounts keep alive with breath the memory of those we love and miss dearly. Words as whispers drenched in tears help release the trauma. A trauma that at times threatens to swallow us whole.
So let us take those steps together.
Let us be willing to fully hold the grief, for it is love in another form. Let us be willing to tend to our own souls by crying tears that nourish the soil. By laughter that makes the birds sing. By holding in embrace those that need the press of their heart on yours.
For it, all comes back to love.
Tend to that love. Without the story of victimhood. For that is a dicey tightrope to walk. Tend to that love without inebriation of vice. Tend to that love with nourishing love that brings back to life the flowers of our soul.
New flowers. New light.
A light in the lament.
Gone from this form but forever formless with us.
To those who have loved and lost, I see you in all your splendour. And I hold space for you in my heart and soul to speak alive the love grief that has etched on your bones.
I would love to hear from you.
From my tending heart to yours,
Steve
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Hello Hedge Schoolers,
Let me begin with a poem to frame our inquiry this week.
Sanctity
No harm done
I'm just viewing
from the shadow
without violence in my heart
But the eye cuts deep
to lacerated
understandings
of what it means to
hold dear the sacred
Lost in confusion
amongst shiny pictures
of postures
I look
with an empty gaze
at a transaction
of violence
that I just can't stop
The desire pulses
in innocence
wrestled from the jaws
of hush-hush business
Manifested perversions
grip with a toxicity
I die to every day
There is love
in the reverence
but death in the execution
Talk to me men
about ways that harness
the purity
That revere with sanctity
the beauty I withhold
Talk to me women
about ways to hold
the feeling
in ways that feel held
Bring the talk to the table
where love is served best
Connection in connection
of deep and beautiful love
Music Acknowledgement
resonance by airtone (c) copyright 2020 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution
Noncommercial (3.0) license. http://dig.ccmixter.org/files/airtone/61321
I wrote this poem after a deep journey. A journey that highlighted the hidden.
The repression of what it feels to feel. The passion. The desire. The guilt. The shame.
Growing up in an Irish Catholic family, my introduction to the world of sex was a mix. A mix of my mother diving across the room to turn off the television when a set of boobs came across the screen and my father blushing deeply when we discovered his stash and he had to deliver the birds and bees talk to my brother and me.
Bless.
There was no manual for this when they were growing up. Just brush those beautiful, natural feelings under the rug for they are the devil's work.
So like many others, I felt the need to hide in the shadows when talk came to this.
Miseducated by pornography and playground myth, it led to a completely fractured relationship with the divine. A violent act of objectification without violence in my heart.
All in a bid to feel.
I own all of my infractions. I'm not proud of them. But I am standing up to reclaim the sacredness of this relationship. It is the deepest shadow work I have done. And is always a work in progress.
Honouring the beauty
Consensual sex is just awesome. It is the deepest connection we can have with another being. We enter into a deep relationship where life has the potential to sprout from the magic of our dance together. It is just magic.
A great relationship usually has a great sex life as a cornerstone. Making love with my wife further weaves us together as a couple. We come home to each other, even in the face of all that may be boiling around us. It stokes the fire of our love.
Attraction, arousal are beautifully natural when we are in the right relationship with them.
But at what point does it become objectification? At what point does it go too far?
These are the conversations that we need to have with young people. The conversations we need to have with adults who have yet to become adults. We need containers of dialogue where we can speak freely. To reconnect with the beauty of sacred connection. To embrace our sexuality in all its glory, including the bits we hide in the shadows. An ecosystem of over-sexualisation and pornography does not breed the right relationship.
Open dialogue is a path forward. Holding space for people to make conscious their inner feelings and thoughts can be alchemical in nature. Two examples from my own experience holding space spring to mind.
I have run Sexual Education classes for Year 3-12 students for over 20 years. Holding space for deep and open discourse about a topic that most call taboo has been a joy. I have run classes with boys and girls together and separately. The giggles. The blushing. The laughter when I say certain words out loud.
“This is totally awks Mr. Brophy.”
It sure is, my reply.
But nothing beats the deluge of questions that comes at me when I say to them that I will respond to all questions, just as long as they use the correct scientific terminology. The questions are first submitted anonymously to help create trust but that is quickly dismissed as they see that I truly mean that nothing is off-limits. It has certainly led to some interesting rabbit holes. From my many years of running these sessions, I have found that there is just so much misinformation out there. Because this topic is awkward for some, they have been educated by hearsay and pornography. And I take pride in helping clear up that signal.
One of the most beautiful moments I have had as an educator was during a Body Awareness session, I ran for younger students. During the separate boy’s session, I had a Year 3 student come out. A term was used that this boy took great offence to. He bravely called out the older cooler others before I could interject and proclaimed that he already knew that he liked boys. He was 8. Instead of ridicule, these boys rose as warriors and held him as he stepped into the open. I get goosebumps thinking about this moment. When we create crucibles of trust, we can hold space for all. To be as they are. To be who they are. But it starts as men and women looking at ourselves first. If 9 and 10-year-old boys can rise with such strength, we all can.
There are more informed people than I speaking on this but I did want to speak openly about my truth. To publicly acknowledge the work that I have done and will continue to do and to leave you with the offer of an inquiry into your relationship with the sacred.
There is no judgment here.
Just an open heart and ears, so speak freely from your heart.
Till next week,
Steve
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Welcome to the first Hedge School Podcast. This is the digital accompaniment to each week’s newsletter for your convenience. Would love your feedback.
Steve
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